What Is A Network Marketing Pre-launch?
by Robert Hawthorne on March 1, 2013
To really understand the power of
what I will be launching this summer and what a prelaunch can do for you, let’s
dive into defining what a prelaunch is…
Before we dive in, keep in mind that
the industry that you’ll be a part of is called the Network Marketing industry, which is responsible
for billions of dollars a year in sales for many products and services around
the world annually. (With an estimated $28.56 billion dollars in sales in
the USA alone in 2010 according to the DSA, the leading national
trade association for the industry.)
At its simplest form, Network
Marketing replaces the traditional distribution channels and retail outlets.
Instead of a corporation paying out millions/billions of dollars for
storefronts or marketing/branding campaigns, some opt to launch as a Network
Marketing company to market their products or services.
Anyone that is at least 18 years old
can join a Network Marketing company to become a distributor and retail the
products that the company offers. There is always a sign-up fee involved
to get your distributor pack and products. And once on board, you earn
income in two ways. First, retailing the product to others (signing up
customers) earning a commission (usually a monthly residual commission), and
second, building a team of other distributors and earning commissions from the
sales that they generate.
There are thousands of different
types of compensation plans that are seen in the Network Marketing industry.
But at the end of the day, most pay you for both retailing the product
and building a team. And as your team builds (you enroll a distributor,
who enrolls a distributor, who enrolls a distributor, etc.), the more your
income increases.
Some people become a distributor to
get discounts off of the products with little to no interest in building a
business. Some decide to enroll only to retail the products, but not
build a team of other distributors. Some dabble a little in both.
And there are some who see the business opportunity as a path to freedom
and work hard to generate a six or seven-figure income.
Apart from the products and services
that Network Marketing companies offer, at its core, the industry is about
personal development. The more you improve your mindset, leadership skills,
and build positive habits, the more successful you’ll become. You will
learn incredible life-skills and business lessons that will have dramatic
effects on your income and success in future endeavors.
Network Marketing (also known as
multi-level marketing, MLM, or direct sales) is a business model. It is
not a get-rich-quick deal. It’s also not a pyramid scheme. (Where
the two get confused is that some people who are involved in illegal pyramids
disguise their “business opportunity” as a Network Marketing company in an
attempt to stay under the radar.) Network Marketing is a highly regulated
industry and companies that are operating illegally or as a pyramid get shut
down by the Feds. A recent company that was shut down was called Fortune Hi-tech
Marketing. They had no real products and their business was mainly a
recruiting game. They got caught and were shut down within the last month
or two.
Companies that are legit are often
members of the Direct Selling Association (DSA), which has very strict
enrollment requirements – and it can often take Network Marketing company years
to get approved.
Now that you have a base
understanding of Network Marketing, lets go into the prelaunch side…
When a Network Marketing company is
preparing to launch, one of the best strategies to use to put them on the map
on day 1 is a prelaunch. Done correctly, a prelaunch can take a Network
Marketing company from zero to millions of dollars in revenue.
Additionally, the distributors who pre-built their organizations during
the pre-launch have the opportunity to earn a part-time or even a full-time
monthly income right out of the gate.
Over the years, many people and
companies would “hype” their business opportunity. Many showed images of
fast cars, mansions, people on the beach, and flashed piles of $100 bills.
Those types of prelaunches attract the “get rich quick” folks and often
collapse within 60 days as everyone who enrolled leaves to join the next launch
in their quest to becoming rich over night.
A true prelaunch is hype-free, but
still exciting. When you join a prelaunch, you have the opportunity to
pre-build your business VERY quickly, which is incredibly exciting! You
can shave months, even years off of the business-building curve. Think of
it this way…
You decide that you want to open up
a new restaurant in town called, “My Yummy Food”. You don’t have much of
a marketing budget, so you decide to do all you can to get your restaurant to
go viral in your community prior to your grand opening.
A month prior to your opening, you
make a few fliers and post them around town announcing that My Yummy Food will
be opening on such-and-such date. The flyer also has a link to your
website that simply has a form to fill out announcing the pre-launch of your
restaurant and a special offer. People go to the website and enter in
their name and email address to stay posted on the official launch and register
for your prelaunch.
You start sending emails about all
of the exciting dishes that you’ll have on your menu. You also give
everyone their own replicated website where they can refer their friends to
your restaurant website to opt-in for the notification list and get their free
replicated websites. You then decide to announce that everyone who shares their
website with their friends who show up and order food at the grand opening will
earn one free appetizer for everyone thy refer. And then if any of their
friends or their friends or their friends share and show up, then they can earn
additional free appetizers. Amazing!
People start sharing their website
with everyone they know. They post on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, send
texts, make calls, etc. People are excited because they know that the
more people they enroll, the more free appetizers that they’ll have to enjoy.
Everyone in town starts telling
others about your restaurant and the date of the grand opening. The
excitement spreads to other towns and counties in your state. Finally,
your grand opening happens and thousands of people show up to order their
favorite dish and are compensated with free appetizers for all the friends they
referred, that those people referred, that those people referred, and so on.
That’s what happens in a Network
Marketing Prelaunch. People enroll, for free, to get their own
replicated website that they can share with people they know to begin
pre-building their team of distributors. The typical prelaunch lasts only
about 30 days, so it is critical that you put in as much time, energy, and
attention into the prelaunch as you can. And come launch day, the company
will officially open their doors to enroll distributors and customers.
During the official post-launch
enrollment period you enroll as a distributor and call everyone that you have
personally enrolled to do the same. They repeat that process, and so do
hundreds, even thousands of others. And thanks to technology, the typical
upgrade period to become a paid distributor for the company is 5-7 days, so it
does not matter the order people enroll into the system. Everything is
tracked so your organization stays in place.
So what happens if you don’t join
the company during the upgrade period? Well, you lose your spot in the
company and you cannot earn commissions from distributors or customers.
In order to make money in Network Marketing, you have to be an active
distributor. This means you have purchased your distributor kit and meet
the monthly volume requirements (which is usually ordering the minimum amount
of product each month on auto-ship).
Once the prelaunch is over, your
focus then shifts to working with everyone on your team and helping them get
their businesses established. You then spend your time between working
with your current team, enrolling new customers, and always being on the
lookout for other team-builders that you can personally enroll into your
business.
If you worked very hard during the
prelaunch, the potential is there to be earning a part-time or even a full-time
monthly income right out of the gate. I won’t lie. It takes work.
Any and every business takes work. However…
I do not know of any other industry
that provides the amazing opportunities that the Network Marketing industry
provides. When you find a stable company with amazing products, customers
will often stay on the products for years, even decades. So the
work that you do today could pay you for many, many, many years ahead.
That is called residual income. And I personally know people who
have built Network Marketing organizations in the early 90′s that are still
paid a six, even seven-figure income today – even though they haven’t touched
their business in nearly 20 years!
That is freedom. And THAT is what I love about this industry. It’s not
just the personal freedom – it is about helping others become free.
That’s where the rewards really are. The money is great, but being
responsible for helping someone better their life, get out of debt, quit their
job, etc. is the true reward at the end of the day.
As you progress in your Network
Marketing journey, you’ll find that the more people you help become successful,
the more successful you will become (one of my favorite quotes – - and it’s
100% true).
And best of all, many Network
Marketing companies are heavily involved in charitable work inside and outside
of the US. This provides you with many opportunities to ‘give back’ to
the community, help others, and and truly build a business that is making a
difference in the world. Between recruiting others to show a path to
freedom, enrolling customers to get them on amazing products, and being a part
of charities helping children, feeding the homeless, etc. you can truly build a
legacy and a business to be extremely proud of.
The Fast Track To A Network Marketing Pre-launch Success
So now you know that a NetworkMarketing Prelaunch allows you to pre-build your team of distributors prior to
a Network Marketing (MLM) company officially opening their doors to accept paid
distributor and customer enrollments.
The main purpose of a prelaunch is
for you to get a head start to building your business. Because there is
no cost to enroll into a prelaunch, you have a great opportunity to pre-build a
team of tens, hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of people who are
also excited about the company, products, and business opportunity.
One mistake that people often make
is not take their Network Marketing prelaunch seriously. Because it costs
$0.00 to enroll during a prelaunch, some people dabble a little in the launch
by posting a link or two on Facebook or their blog and hope something great
happens from it.
Unless you are a though leader with
a massive following of thousands of people who are all chomping at the bit to
read your next blog post or Tweet, it will require a bit more work.
Remember, the more active you are during the prelaunch the more
successful you will be come launch day.
Treat
This Prelaunch A Business
The fastest way to success during a
prelaunch is to treat this as a business on day ONE. Learn all you can
about the company, products, and compensation plan. Talk to others.
Market your replicated website on all social networks, blogs, forums, and
every possible way you can think of or learn about.
The GREAT news is that for the
prelaunch that I’m working on here is that we are doing 90% of the social media
marketing work for you. I cannot go into all the details here, but lets
just say that you and everyone on your team will be fully armed with all the
social media marketing materials that you need – and more on day one.
Pick
Up Your Phone
The next Network Marketing fast
track secret is picking up your phone. Remember, Network Marketing is
about people and relationships. You cannot build a strong relationship
with someone via email alone. You need to make that personal connection
via the phone. And if you happen to live near someone, face-to-face is
obviously even better.
Those who pick up the phone and call
the people who enroll onto their website and make a friend and invite that
person onto the next company call or webinar will have MUCH, MUCH more success
than someone who never picks up the phone. I have seen this play out
multiple times. The results are night and day. So a skill that you
can begin to develop now is talking to someone briefly on the phone. It’s
not rocket science and nothing to be concerned about. I’ll be providing
talking points and scripts to everyone on my team come launch day.
Begin
With The End In Mind
Next, begin with the end in mind.
Set your goal and work towards it. Meaning, lets say that your goal
is to have a total of 100 people on your team come launch day. Now you
don’t have to personally enroll all 100. You could enroll 5 who enroll a
handful each, who enroll a handful each, and so on. Because this is
Network Marketing, this is exactly what you want to see happen. You want
people that you bring into the business duplicate what you are doing.
And don’t be afraid to set your
goals high. During my first prelaunch, I had a hard time thinking that I
would have even 5,000 people sign up in my prelaunch organization. When I
surpassed that, I said 10,000 would be amazing. When I surpassed that, I
said OK, I’m shooting for 20,000 people. On day 30 I had over 30,000
people pre-enrolled into the prelaunch.
The thing for me then was that I was
unemployed. I was broke. I had no choice but to make the prelaunch
work. I put in a lot of time and effort. I didn’t post a link to my
replicated website a few times one day and hope for the best. I worked
the business each and every single day to build momentum which carried forward
throughout the entire team. So at the end of the day, I had a very big
“WHY”.
Define
Your “Why”
So next up is to define your own
“WHY” so clearly that you know with absolute conviction where you are headed
and why. Your “why” needs to be deeply and emotionally connected.
It’s the passion and fuel that you will refer to often to help you
surpass limited thinking or self-imposed boundaries.
Why is your “why”?
Is it to double your current income
within the next 12 months and work this business full-time? Is it to save
for a college fund? Is it to buy a new car? Is it to bring in a new
income stream that would allow your spouse to stay home with the kids? Is
it to help a loved one? What is there in your life that you could get so
passionate about that it becomes your major driving force and mission in life?
Some people already have their
“why”. Others have to think a little about it. And there are others
that really have to think about their driving force “why” to figure out what it
is that they truly want. So don’t beat yourself up and your main driving
force “why” isn’t on the tip of your tongue. I’ve had to really work on
my “why” over the past few weeks to drill it down to a laser focused series of
goals that make up my “why”.
I have even taken it up a level and
took my “why” and made a 15 page document that has images relating to my goals
that make up my “why”. I look at them on my computer and have them
printed out in my office covering my wall. I look at these images and my
written out “why’s”
More Information
Bob Mills
(909)627-6931
