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Is Your Direct Sales Business Seasonal?
When something is said to be seasonal we generally think of it as pertaining to one of the four natural divisions of the year, spring, summer, fall, and winter. When I ask if your direct sales business is seasonal, I’m sure a handful of consultants would agree that they have a fall business – meaning October and November are extremely busy for them due to the rich gift giving season. But then not much going on during the other three seasons.
In order to have a successful, thriving direct sales business you really need to have a business that operates in all four seasons: spring, summer, fall AND winter; not spring, summer, fall OR winter. To illustrate this concept, consider what regular tasks need to be accomplished during each season.
Spring: A time of new growth, and also lots of weeds and possibly spring cleaning of remaining fall leaves. If you don’t keep up with this task regularly the weeds will choke out all non-weed plants and if you don’t pick up the remaining leaves it could kill new grass that is trying to grow. You can’t just work it periodically.
Summer: Weeding and mowing the lawn are regular occurrences. If you have a swimming pool, you’ll need to test the water, add chemicals and skim regularly. You can’t just work it periodically. Continue reading
Responsible Posting
Forums, Facebook pages, tweets and emails – just a few ways to communicate to your customers and team members. Can you even imagine what it must have been like when the Pony Express, the west’s most direct means of east-west communication before the telegraph, was the only method of communication?
One of the challenges with instant communication methods is that it is far too easy to just post something without truly having an opportunity to think it through first. It’s also out there for all to read as soon as it is posted. For this reason it is imperative that if you choose to participate in online public communication, you post responsibly. Likewise, while reading such posts, keep in mind that just because it is now published does not necessarily mean it is accurate or factual.
The example post below will help illustrate the importance of word choice:
“Double check your xxx, it is calculating wrong.”
That would be fine, and a courtesy to others to give their own information a second glance, if we knew for certain that information was entirely accurate.
What else was wrong with the above post?
- At that moment, the team member’s information appeared to be inaccurate, yet it was posted that it is wrong.
- There was a corporate memo put out explaining why it would be different or why the information could fluctuate. This may have merely been a case misunderstanding or oversight on the part of the consultant who stated it was wrong.
How Are You Really Spending Your Time?
Busy busy busy. No time. Wish I had more time. So much to do. Argh! I’ll never get it all done. 
Sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. Maintaining a successful direct sales business is definitely work. Many consultants certainly enjoy what they do, but nonetheless it is still work. Those who are doing fairly well and are managing a large organization either have good time management skills or good delegation skills or a little of both.
Those consultants who say they truly do have the desire to succeed but claim they aren’t successful due to time constraints may be able to eke out a little more time to work their business. That said, if I were to show you how to have more time to work your business, is that all it would take for you to get your next promotion in rank?
If you honestly believe you’re not successful or not as successful as you would like to be in your direct selling business right now because you simply don’t have enough time, then it’s time to take a deeper look at the root cause why you don’t have enough time.
Do a time study for one week.
You’ve heard of dieters keeping a food log of everything they put in their mouth for a period of time; this is the same thing – only it involves how you are spending your time. Don’t worry about tracking your time on the weekend. All workers are entitled to have a weekend off from working. Starting Monday morning from the time your feet hit the floor, write down the various activities you do – and don’t cheat, you want to be successful, remember? Cheaters never win and winners never cheat. Finish tracking your activities Friday evening. Continue reading
Don’t Let the Turkeys Get You Down
Direct Sales is a fabulous business with so many excellent benefits, features and reasons to be involved. Meeting some super people is another positive aspect of having your own direct selling business. Though as the cliché says – you can’t have a rainbow without a little rain.
Like any other business, direct sales is not exempt from attracting a few humdingers. We’ve all encountered team members, prospects, corporate staffers, customers and consultants from other teams who we would not invite to our Christmas party. For suggestions on dealing with challenging people who come into your path, see this article about how you don’t have to like your co-workers.
People never cease to amaze me. Yesterday I received a notice that someone left a comment on one of my business YouTubes. Great, comments are generally a good thing. To my surprise, it was a fellow consultant, not someone within my team, who decided to spam my video with a link to her own website. What? Who does that? Of course I had the ‘delete comment’ button at my control, but I just can’t even imagine what would possess someone to do that; nonetheless these folks do exist. Continue reading
The Golden Email
Today’s post on e-mail etiquette is an important one as it relates to professionalism. This is an area in which many home based consultants could use some pointers. I am pleased to welcome the author of this article, guest blogger, William Eve, who has joined us previously to discuss Network Strategies.
Email has become as ubiquitous as a phone call- no matter where you are, you almost always have access to e-mail. With that ease of access, so too has come the slack in writing etiquette. In business, any correspondence should carry with it a certain amount of propriety and style, e-mail included. Here are some tips to make sure every e-mail you send, sends with it a clear message of professionalism.
Before Writing
Before a single word is written in an e-mail, consider two things: What are you trying to say or ask, remember this will first exist as just a subject in the recipient’s inbox.
What are you trying to say? Ask yourself this question. Are you looking for an answer to a question? Is it urgent? Can it wait? Are there other people involved? Ensure that whatever you write is pertinent to what you are writing and why. Consider also that most people access their e-mails on mobile devices and have limited screen space. Having to read a multi-page e-mail can be difficult on such devices. Make it short, get to the point.
It starts as a subject. Remember- before an e-mail is opened, it exists only as a subject in the recipient’s inbox. Do not add multiple exclamation points if you feel the e-mail is important. Simple makes a better subject. If possible, sum up the entire purpose for the e-mail in the subject. Use the body of the e-mail as support information for your subject.
When Writing
When writing an e-mail, remember that this is not an instant messenger client reserved for you and your friends. This, most often, is a monitored for of communication for the business. This means that very likely, most of your e-mails are logged. Never write an e-mail you wouldn’t feel comfortable sending everybody.
Don’t send it to everybody. Too often, e-mails are blindly sent to a large group without considering who this message is really intended for. Consider who really needs this information and who doesn’t. Know the difference between CC and BCC. When it comes to e-mail, CC is usually someone that needs to be in the loop but not necessarily contribute. CC recipients are visible to everyone. BCC is reserved for people that you need to apprise of a situation- BCC recipients are invisible to everyone else.
Don’t send a wall of text. This is especially a problem when composing e-mail on a mobile device. Use line breaks, separate ideas and help the reader understand content. Don’t send 30 lines of text with no breaks in them. It’s hard to read and hard to follow.
Before Hitting Send
Too often, people finish their thought and hit send. This is not only unprofessional and irresponsible, you also then unload the burden of spelling and grammar errors onto the reader. Make sure, before you hit send, that you review these simple steps:
- Did you ask what you needed to ask?
- Does your subject match your body e-mail?
- Re-read the e-mail, check for spelling errors, use spell-check if you have it.
- If you require an answer by a certain time, did you include that?
- Did you include important information the recipient does not already have?
- Have you included attachments?
- Have you included contact information?
Simply put, e-mail is best thought of as a faster business letter. Most of these rules when writing a business letter have been lost on the e-mail generation. Take your time, write something clear, concise, professional and you will be well on your way to better corporate communique.
This article was written by William from homeloanfinder.com.au. Visit HomeLoanFinder to compare home loan interest rates and find the right mortgage broker.
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