Network Marketing Experiences - -->Internet Marketing Success

Relationship Selling aka Consultative Selling

As my online experience grows and evolves I am able to share some insights that will hopefully shorten your learning curve. So many that I talk to are consumed with generating leads with absolutely no thought as to what they are going to do with their leads when they get them. Relationship Selling skills are extremely important to develop. A sales follow up system is particularly important to have in place before you get leads.

In this regard I am teaching small business owners Relationship Selling Principles which will translate into more prospects/customers, more sales and higher customer retention through repeat business. Building relationships is paramount to lasting business success. For more information on this topic: http://relationshipselling.org. As much as we would like to build our business completely online; offline tools such as the telephone and good old snail mail have their place. Many I talk to are leaving money on the table. So much energy has gone into getting leads that most have no idea on what to do next. Combining online methods with a sales follow up system such as the picking up the phone or sending business thank you cards.

Business Opportunity Lead

Regardless of what your Business Opportunity, lead generation is the achilles heel both offline and online. Thousands of people have read Ann Sieg's The Renegade Network Marketer. For me it was a huge Oprah lightbulb moment. No matter how diligent you are in your business; no matter how many books you read or how many seminars you attend at the end of the day you need to have business opportunity leads.

For those that have exhausted their list of family and friends, moving online appears to be the perfect solution. However if you get this one thing wrong you will be wasting your time and your money.

I've been kicking around both offline and online now for a number of years and have finally discovered the missing link. Now I'm not saying I have found a get rich quick scheme or that no work is involved; nothing could be further from the truth!. What I am saying is that I can plug you into the best free training available today on the internet. The first days training alone will reveal to you why you haven't been successful in your previous endeavors to generate your business opportunity leads.

Simply fill in your first name and email on the widget on the sidebar for instant access. I would really appreciate your feedback in the comments. :)

Paradigm Shift: Simply seeing information in a new way. We are in a business paradigm shift. In the World is Flat, Thomas Friedman says the world is becoming flat; as flat as our computer screens. To read more some highlights of his book see my hub: Network Marketing Endorsed by Thomas Friedman? He also says that for the first time the playing field has been leveled and we can all participate as individuals. We need to be on the playing field as a team.

For the first time in history all network marketers can come together as a team for the benefit of all. Finally, an environment of abundance; no competition.

a true win/win for all.

The "B" Quadrant is the "We" Quadrant

*********************************************************************************************************************

Monday

Apr052010

Relationship Selling: The Sale Starts Before The Sale

Monday, April 5, 2010 at 11:43AM

In Relationship Selling aka Consultative Selling, the sales follow up starts before a sale takes place. Your goal is to be sincere and genuinely develop a rapport with your prospect or customer. It is more important to think long term than to just achieve a one time sale.

When you ask questions to find common ground initially you build trust. It also gives you something to talk about in a follow up call to break the ice. To jump in and ask if they are ready to purchase is about you not about them.

The only way to get to know your customer is to have a natural conversation and get them to expand beyond a simple yes or no. These first questions are to establish rapport, trust and respect.

Your next set of questions is to get to know their wants and needs. People typically won't tell you their real reason for wanting to buy a product or service. You want to dig deeper to discover their emotional reason for wanting to purchase. You will want to be taking notes through out this conversation so you are prepared when you start the sales follow up.

In the relationship selling process there are multiple ways to follow up with people in addition to a phone call. If they are not ready to purchase after that initial consultation; ask them when would be a good time to give them a quick call and tell them you are putting it on your calendar. This alone can save a lot of time that gets wasted with telephone tag. Send a follow up email thanking them for their time and highlighting key points and noting when you will be calling.

Business thank you cards are a great way to keep your name in front of people without being obtrusive. People are far more likely to pick up the phone or respond to an email if there is a card sitting on their desk or counter with your picture, contact information and your desire to help them grow their business. People have told me they have posted cards from me on their wall and that everyone comments on them when they enter their office.

So you can see that relationship selling involves learning about your prospect and establishing rapport in that first meeting. This will pave the way for a long term relationship whether they purchase immediately or not. This will result in repeat sales.

Renegade Coach |

1 Comment |

Wednesday

Mar032010

Relationship Selling: Offline vs Online

Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 12:41PM

If you've been trying to build your business online for any length of time you are probably coming to the realization that it isn't as easy as you thought it would be. Network marketing is all about building and maintaining relationships. This in done through learning some relationship selling skills.

Network Marketers are flocking online to find ways to generate leads. There is a lot of hype about generating 1000s of free leads. Realistically could you deal with 1000s of leads? Not likely. What if you really only needed 2-4 leads a week? Leads that you could actually follow up with on the phone? As much as we would like to run our business completely online the truth of the matter is that the telephone is still a very important tool.

Now if you learn how to target your market and learn a few SEO skills the people you will attract will be highly qualified. This in itself will filter out a lot of people that are not serious.

People that read your content and opt-in to your newsletter are a much better prospect than the ones that you cold call or buy bulk leads.

In fact an increasing dilemna that I'm seeing is that people have no idea what to do with their leads once they have attracted them! This is where learning relationship selling skills becomes important. Learning some proper sales follow up techniques so that you have multiple ways to stay in contact with your list. Relying on email alone doesnt' cut it anymore. In fact the open rate is less than 20%. I didn't want to believe it until those results showed up in my auto-responder stats.

In today's market you need to always be learning and honing your skills. Learning new skills and having mutliple ways to follow up with people. Making use of online methods as well as using old-fashioned methods such as picking up the telephone or sending a business thank you card in the mail.

Renegade Coach |

Mike Klinger & Ann Sieg's: Renegade Breakthrough Mentoring Program

Sunday, May 17, 2009 at 03:46PM

Ann Sieg (Renegade Network Marketer) & Mike Klingler (Renegade University) recently launched Renegade Professional and Renegade Breakthrough Mentoring Program (RBMP). I’d like to explain how Renegade Breakthrough is different from Renegade Professional and how the two work hand in glove.

Mike Klingler and Ann Sieg's Renegade Breakthrough is a revolutionary new mentoring program for members of Renegade Professional. (You can check out the free Renegade University for a free test drive of what Renegade Professional has to offer.) It’s a unique opportunity that will help you take everything you learn in Renegade Professional (and your business) to the next level. Most of it they’ve never shared with anyone.

According to Ann Sieg Renegade Breakthrough Mentoring Program (RBMP) is a Business Development Strategy. Renegade Professional (R-Pro) is for traffic generation.

The Renegade Breakthrough is about mindset development. The breakthrough program is about awareness not just skill set. It’s not always just developing skill sets; although developing relationship selling skills is important. It’s also having an awareness in mind. Ann Sieg and Mike Klingler will be mentoring us through this process.

In lesson two Ann Sieg talks about the rinse and repeat process. Ann encourages us to simply trust the process.

Ann and Mike are giving us the opportunity to have awareness of things they had to learn the slow, hard way. This is a program that you will return to over and over. In one or two months you will view the information at an entirely new level of awareness. You will have AHAs that you didn’t even see the first time through.

Learning the tools of lead generation is only half the equation, Renegade Breakthrough Mentoring Program (RBMP) can be viewed as a supplement to Renegade Professional (R-Pro).

Renegade Breakthrough is simply more effective than other coaching, mentoring programs.

Why?

People learn by doing, by taking action. Secondly, people learn better and faster in a supportive environment, in a like-minded community.

That is exactly what Renegade Breakthrough is about. You will actively be creating content and building your business with help and feedback from Ann Sieg, Mike Klingler and others.

Read: Before purchasing the Renegade Breakthrough Program

In conclusion Renegade Breakthrough Mentoring Program is meant to complement Renegade Professional. This mentoring program is to facilitate a mindset shift to a higher level. Renegade Breakthrough is about developing a new awareness and is about helping people get into action. Ann Sieg and Mike Klingler want you getting results as quickly as possible . On a more personal note, Mike Klingler saved me from action paralysis. His step by step, click by click tutorials had me posting content before I knew it! I have already had some exciting AHAs with the Renegade Breakthrough and we’ve only just begun!

To your $uccess,

Irene Kirkman

Renegade Coach |

Eulogy for my sister Verna, a True Inspiration

Wednesday, April 22, 2009 at 12:38PM

A while back I wrote a hubpage about my sister: My sister Verna A Lesson in Overcoming; little did I know that she wasn't long for this world.

This is the eulogy I wrote for Verna. It needs work but I am still far too raw to edit it further.

Our little ray of sunshine was born June 30th, 1958. I still remember Mom waving her hankie out the window of her room at Grace Hospital in Vancouver; now known as BC Women’s Hospital.

Verna was born with bilateral hip dislocation and underwent several surgeries to try and shorten the ligaments. This involved being in a plaster cast with her legs akimbo for several months. I remember I started changing diapers at age 9 which was awkward with a plaster cast to contend with. Verna was almost always smiling and co-operative. The same surgery was performed successfully on a neighbor child which may have been the catalyst for trying the surgery again. To no avail, they said that Verna's other issues complicated matters.
We lived in a little house in Burnaby near Lougheed Mall; just up the road from Costco which used to be a field of horses.

Thanks to Verna we got our first TV set in the early 60s.

We moved to 616 Gatensbury, Coquitlam in the spring of 1963. Our parents bought that house simply because the hallway was wide enough to manouver Verna's bed up and down the hall so she could be with the family for dinner.

I was finishing Grade 2 and Howard was in Grade 5? I can remember being shocked years later when Mom said she left us each home to babysit while she took the other one to school to register. No handy dart in those days! No wheelchair access and definitely no transportation for anyone in a bed!

Around this time Verna was in RCH; I believe this may be where she developed her 1st staph infection and spent time in isolation; a dreadful place with no windows. Verna's sunny disposition saw her through.

They said she would never walk but Verna never read that manual and so she walked.

I remember when my Mom went back to work; I would pull Verna home from the sitters in a wagon. One particular day some kids were walking home from school and laughing and pointing at Verna. This is my first memory of her talking to her fingers. She was saying to one hand, what's wrong Verna and the other hand was saying It's okay Verna; back and forth. Through out her life she used this as a mechanism to talk herself through situations. Kind of like one hand represented good and one bad. If there was ever something we wanted Verna to do and she didn't want to do it she would chat back and forth, come to a decision and usually co-operate.

Verna was able to walk for several years. In her late teens though she ended up at Sunny Hill for an extended period of time. This may have when she had plates and pins put in her hips for stability.

I remember she turned of age while at Sunny Hill and the only residence the could come up with for Verna was an old folks home.

My mother hit tilt!

This would have been the worst possible solution for Verna who thrived on social interaction and was constantly lighting up people's lives.

Some how the Richmond/Vancouver DDA came to the rescue and Verna was moved to 55B on Arlington.

She worked for several years at various workshops doing such jobs as putting napkins and cutlery in bags for the airlines. Then the fair wage act backfired and many jobs like these went away.
My brother Howard was always a big hockey fan. In those days with one TV the entire family watched what was on. So Hockey Night in Canada was a family ritual. Howard was the colour guy and took us through the play by play; sometimes rattling the windows with a big: "He shoots! He scores!"

Verna loved it and the word hockey and Howard became synonymous. For years if anyone mentioned hockey; Verna would say Howard.

At one point the Vancouver Canucks took Verna and a group from the DDA on the Royal Hudson. This was in the Tiger Williams era and Verna knew many of the Canucks by name.

Verna had a gift for faces and names and remembered everyone she met. Years later she would still know that person. My uncle Ruddy made a big impression on Verna and taught her to drink a milkshake with a straw by letting her eat the ice cream off the end of the straw. Years later she remembered him by name.

Verna was a very orderly person and maintained her 2 box tape and CD collection in perfect order. You dare not put a tape back in the wrong place! It was impossible to know her sequence; possibly it was the order she received them but it was her system and she wouldn't allow you to mess it up.

Being is a wheelchair for so many years really developed Verna's upper body strength. You definitely didn't want to get in an arm wrestle with her because she always won!

Verna was a big Treky fan and that was her Halloween costume for years.

At one time Verna was a huge Michael Jay Fox fan and there were posters of Michael plastered all over her hospital room at VGH. She loved Donny Osmond, Abba, the Beatles and of course she was a huge fan of Elvis. More recently she attended Mama Mia and put ABBA back at the top of her favorite list.

Elvis actually put in an appearance at her 40th birthday party; He got down on one knee and sang to her. Elvis lives! as far as Verna was concerned. He also put in an appearance a couple of years ago at Leida & Jamie's wedding where he tossed her his scarf.

Verna knew and loved a tremendous number of people. In fact one of her care givers, Sherry took her to the Vancouver Folk Festival and afterwards she said to me. "Next time I take Verna there I'm wearing a t-shirt that says: "I'm with Verna"

A very dark time in Verna's life was when her body rejected the pins in her hips which had been put in about 15 years earlier at VGH. She got seriously ill. Valerie took her to Burnaby hospital but was sent home. She ended up at VGH where she was transfused overnight. My parents came home to find the front door of there house wide open and all their valuables stolen. This was the beginning of a several month ordeal. Verna spent the entire Expo 86 in hospital overlooking the site from her room. Her one trip to Expo was to go to McDonalds. She loved Ronald!

The reinforcing plates were removed to allow antibiotics to cope with a staph infection. She had wounds in her hips, one the size of an orange and one the size of a grapefruit. They were changing her dressings every 4 hours and couldn't understand why she was screaming in pain and trying to crawl off the back of her bed. She was screaming: "Save me Mommy, Save me Daddy"; and they were helpless.

I remember my Mom saying it was worse than the Spanish Inquisition. The reason only became known in mid-November, a fractured left femur was revealed on an X-ray discovered by the Resident surgeon.

I believe in the Fall of 1987 Verna had a plate put back in her hip for stability so that even though her other leg was forever broken she was able to transfer on her own.

We can see by pictures from various events Verna's gradual deterioration. Verna was dancing at weddings in 1980 but was in a wheelchair for my wedding in 1985. Still dancing; just not with her feet. One of the remarkable things about Verna is that she maintained her sunny disposition in spite of all her many obstacles. She never bemoaned the fact that she could no longer walk. She accepted it and moved on. Quite the role model for those that let circumstance get in the way.

Even in Verna's final weeks she endured much pain and yet was always pleased to see me and her other visitors. I'm sure the hospital staff must have wondered who this little person was who garnered so much attention.

Verna was always delighted to see me. She would smile with her whole face and do her best to talk. I can assure you that if I had been in her place I would not have been smiling. When I put on an Elvis CD she tried to dance although so weak she could barely lift her arms. If she could move it she did even if it was just her toe!

Verna lived a happy and fulfilled life. Her caregivers and friends that she met stayed friends with her even when they no longer lived under the same roof. I commented on several occasions that Verna had more of a social life than me! There was always birthdays, Christmas or some special event happening.

My Mom often said that Verna was as close to an angel as she would ever see.

I love what one of my online friends, Candace said in her card to me:

“I know your sister will be watching over you with the beautiful smile you remember and cheering you on in all things. Every gentle breeze are her wings fluttering by you and giving you strength.”....truly an angel above that looks out for me.

A couple of quotes:

A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. James Keller

“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” Buddha quote

Verna in her own way lit the candle of many lives.

Renegade Coach |

1 Comment |

tagged

inspiration in

Inspiration

Saturday

Apr182009

Recession Fear Fueled by Suze Orman?The Bull (& The Bear) Of It All

Saturday, April 18, 2009 at 07:21PM

Recessions happen. Recessions come and go with amazing consistency. On average there is a recession approximately every 5 years. Admittedly some are shorter and not so drastic but we have been here before.

What makes this recession different? Why is there so much fear, bordering on panic this time? Are financial advisors like Suze Orman or David Bach fuelling the fear talking about it so much? Or are they simply filling a need? Or is the media in general to blame?

You can't tune into the news without hearing something about the recession. In fact you hear the same sound bites over and over again.

How about a history lesson?

We've all heard of the Great Depression. History shows there has been one recession after another. And yes, worse than the current one. When it gets really bad they call it a depression. We seem to have very short memories. With the media playing these same sound bites over and over again until we truly believe the sky is falling.

If you look at the diagram below you can see the timeline for bull and bear markets going back to 1956.

A bull market being defined as a positive move greater than 15% that last for at least 3 months and a bear market as a negative move greater than 15% lasting at least 3 months.

The first bar in the graph shows a bear market which dropped to -15% and lasted 17 months. This was followed by a bull market which rose 104% and lasted 48 months.

Since 1956 there have been 10 bull markets and 11 bear markets. You can see that bull markets last much longer and have a more significant percentage change.

Bear markets averaged -27% and lasted only 14 months. During this same period bull markets have averaged 148% and lasted 48 months. Not a bad reward for surviving the risk of bear markets.

Typically investors spend more time in a positive bull market than in a negative bear market. Bull markets on average last longer and have a more significant percentage change. Bear markets on the other hand are briefer yet they engender a lot of fear. This is the time when there are bargains to be found.People like Warren Buffet look at this recession and see that real estate and stocks are all on sale.

According to this chart by Mackenzie Investments we have been in this mess before! And we are a good 8 months into this one if you are in Canada and 15 months into it if you are in the US. Now with the average being 17 months; I would say there is light at the end of the tunnel!

The average gain in a bull market is +148% and the average length is 48 months vs

The average loss in a bear market is -27% and the average length is 14 months.

I think what is reassuring about this graph is that we have been there before and the ensuing rise is substantial. The last one was also -45%, lasted 25 months and then rose 108% and lasted 61 months!

The chart also shows that the bull/bear market sticks pretty close to 5 year cycles.

Suze Orman offers some strategies for surviving this recession. It's good advice as far as it goes. But why survive when you can thrive?

Having a fear based mentality serves no purpose. Some of the richest people in the world got rich in times of recession. Bill Gates for example. While others were lining up for gas he was in a dorm room somewhere and well the rest is history.

I remember only too well when the mortgage rates were 18%. Those were tough times. I also remember that same period of time being a boon for some friends of mine. They had actually separated, sold their house and banked about $100 grand. They got paid 18% interest!

There's no shortage of money, just the distribution of money. I heard once that if all the money in the world was distributed equally that within a few years 95% of us would be back where we started sharing 5% of the money and 5% would have 95% of the wealth.

People like Warren Buffet look at this recession and see that real estate and stocks are all on sale.

Suze Orman offers good advice as far as how to tighten your belt. But, what if you could do something to expand your income circle? The way the law of attraction works is that we get what we focus on the most. Do we really want to keep repeating how bad it is?

I believe if we take a step back and see that we have gone through this recession scenario several times and have always come out far better and for far longer we will take this recession in stride and with a positive outlook. We will look to ways to use this recession to our advantage just the way Bill Gates and Warren Buffet do.

Robert Kiyosaki says that the only difference between the rich and the rest of us is the way they think. It's all about mindset. It's about seeing opportunity where others see disaster.

Renegade Coach |

3 Comments |

tagged

bull market in