Several great leaders have said that if you use the system, it does 90% of the work. We usually talk about it as a water pipe that we'd do well to use in order to get the big leverage effect everyone in direct selling is after.
The system works a bit like a recipe. The more carefully you follow it, the better it can live up to your expectations of the concept. If you only work with customers, it doesn't matter that much. You can bring in customers any way you like, as long as you follow Direct Selling Sweden's code of ethics. It's when you start working with other people that it pays to use the system. How you fill your prospect or candidate lists is up to you, since that happens before the recruiting process begins.
There should be a flow from beginning to end, just like a water pipe, because everything in direct selling is a development process rather than a single event. It isn't just one meeting that leads to a deal, the way it is in traditional selling. Sometimes the word direct selling throws people off, as if a sale is supposed to happen right away, which it can, but the process we're talking about here is the process of recruiting new colleagues.
The first meeting in the recruiting process (the water pipe) is the presentation. Many call it an SP (Short Presentation) and it isn't done by you as a newcomer, but by someone who has been at it for a while, can present and knows what the recruiting process looks like. I find it hard to believe there's any traditional company out there that puts a brand new employee in charge of recruiting people.
”The purpose of a meeting is to book the next meeting” – Randy Gage
Once you've done a presentation, you need to follow up with that person, so the second step is a follow-up. Here we come to one of the most important points of all. 80% of the time you put into the business is short presentations and follow-ups. The challenge is to take the long view and have patience, because only 5% of the result comes from here. It's also important to make sure the water pipe doesn't leak (that the follow-ups actually happen), because a leak means you've held recruiting meetings for nothing, or that you miss out on 95% of the result.
In the middle of the water pipe we find hotel meetings. Once we've held enough meetings in one town, the need for bigger meetings grows. I like this video, which illustrates it well: Prime the pump – Zig Ziglar. Imagine a well out in the countryside that you're going to pump water from. You can pump for quite a while before anything comes out, but if you keep pumping long enough, you'll soon have a flow.
The organisation needs to hold meetings to create the basis for hotel meetings. When there's enough activity in the field (the number of short presentations), the local leadership has a reason to rent a conference room at a hotel and invite people to a Business Presentation (BP).
You can use the hotel meeting as a follow-up. People get a bigger picture of what it's about, more to sink their teeth into and more to base a decision on. All we're after here is to give enough information for each person to make the decision that's right for them. You can never make a decision for someone else, you can only add information.
After the presentation at the hotel there's also a training session for those who have chosen to get started with the business. The key to this is continuity. Running the hotel meeting every other week trains the organisation in continuity and persistence. The meeting and the training also become an opportunity for inspiration and motivation. This isn't something you try. You do it, and you do it for the long haul. Hotel meetings take 15% of the time you've set aside for the business and they also produce 15% of the result.
The last step in the water pipe (the process) is training. Local, regional, national and international training events. Up to the middle of the water pipe it's about informing potential colleagues about what this is, but towards the end it shifts to training those who want to get going. Here, those who want even more information before making a decision are welcome to join, as long as it isn't a planning day for what the activities ahead will look like, because by then you should have decided to get started. The trainings generally take 5% of the time it takes to build the business, but the great thing is that they create 80% of the result.
”Love them and let them grow.” – Randy Gage
There are people who try to find shortcuts and bring people straight to hotel meetings. My experience is that it doesn't work that way. I don't know anyone who started that way, because recruiting is a process. They need to have seen a presentation first, otherwise the system doesn't work. You can't cut the water pipe open in the middle and pour water in there. It's so much easier to fill the pipe from the beginning, but some people still want to learn the hard way.
Short presentation – Follow-up – Business presentation – Trainings (Events, local, regional…)
We plan from right to left and work from left to right. Just as when you make a smoothie, you have to put in what takes up the most space first. The same goes for your calendar. Book things far in advance so you don't miss an important training. Give people early notice about upcoming activities so the whole team has a chance to go. You can't change something you haven't noticed. Awareness is the first step.
I hope you now see that this is about a process rather than closing a deal. Following the system is about following a recipe. The only thing you can do is be professional about what you're doing, so that people want to work with you. Attract people into your life that you'd like to work with, and then simply expose them to the material. Present. Inform. Promote. (promote=to make known, to make something known, to market it.) The truth is that there are people out there who'll be eager to start working with you in direct selling. They aren't aware of it yet, so they aren't looking for you. You need to talk to them.
”The reason why more people haven’t succeed in direct sales isn’t because they haven’t learned enough new things. The reason is that they haven’t master the basics.” -Tim Sales
We have two start dates when it comes to direct selling. The day we got going and the day we understood why. An event contributes so much personal growth, inspiration and leadership that afterwards most people have set considerably higher goals and keep a considerably higher pace, so you simply can't afford not to go. Thanks to the system in direct selling I've come into contact with some of the world's greatest leaders and been coached and trained by the elite of our profession. How? I started going to events. Just showing up shows that you want it. I didn't become a follower, I became a student, which I still am today. There's world class material to study and I can tell you it changed my life. It isn't about what training costs. It's about what it costs if you don't study.
