Aside from the product or services sold, networking is a selling process in many of its other applications. When you are socially networking, networking for a new job or networking to advance in your company, you're really selling yourself. Of course the methods for doing so vary and there are many networking techniques that will help you sell, whatever your product or service maybe. Networking provides procedures and tools for most selling situations. There are, however some situations in sales that require specific networking techniques.
Special Selling Situations
Several well known areas of sales that we feel are especially suited to networking include: real estate, insurance, automobiles, investments, and office equipment like fax machines, copiers, cellular phones and the whole range of products promoted through direct selling.
Leads And Referrals
Many salespeople lump leads and referrals together and call then prospects. There's a big difference between a lead and a referral. A lead can come from someone answering an ad in a trade magazine or looking you up in the phone book. A lead is very important, but it's a name without a reference or connection. You can get plenty of leads without networking. But, with networking, you can get even more leads.
Referrals from networking sources are more vital. They come from someone who has pre-introduced you and has recommended you. The personal referral is the highest level of networking for sales.
The Real Estate Example
Veteran real estate salesman Larry Nehasil asked to comment about referrals said, "Referrals are the lifeblood of the Professional Realtor. No other form of sales lead can equal the personal referral for quality and rate of conversion to an absolute sale. Referrals usually carry a personal recommendation that is highly accepted by the prospective client and provides an excellent 'door opener' for the Real Estate Profession."
He went on to say, "The efficient use and management of a seller's time will determine the degree of success a Realtor will have in the market place. A very well organized weekly schedule must include the establishment, operation and maintenance of a referral network system. Without a referral network system, a sufficient level of active prospects cannot be maintained to assure an adequate number of appointments."
Network Marketing (Multilevel Marketing)
Starting as early as the 1700's when "Yankee peddlers" went from town to town selling their wares from saddle bags, net-working has played an important role in direct sales, those sales made on a one-to-one basis - no middle person involved. In this century people such as Alfred Fuller, H. J. Heinz and William Wrigley started with direct selling and went on to build huge business empires. Networking figured prominently, even in those early days. As customers told their friends and the friends told other friends, a network of buyers developed.
Today, this earliest form of direct selling has been refined still further. In a sales system popularly referred to as Network Sales or Multilevel Marketing or just MLM, the person-to-person concept has been expanded and refined.
How Network/Multilevel Marketing Works
In multilevel marketing the seller is no longer a door-to-door salesperson. Rather he or she becomes a distributor (without a store) selling to the people they know. As they expand, they develop a second tier of salespeople selling the same products to a new and different audience. The second tier can now establish yet another tier, with each higher tier participating in the profits through commissions and overriding bonuses of its next lower tier.
Profits are increased for all participants, as the cost of middle people such as wholesalers, retailers, and jobbers are eliminated. The basis of this unique concept is that the original multilevel marketer is self-replicating, self-financed and self-motivated.
The Integrity Of The System
It's important to recognize that in multilevel marketing, salespeople need only to sell the product. This is very much unlike the widely publicized pyramid schemes and scams of the past where distributors had to make large payments of money to the sales company.
Networking For Network Selling
Mark Moroney, a long-time network marketer from Minnesota, credits networking with his selling success. In seven short months as a Shaklee distributor he and his wife Gayle earned a bonus car and a trip to Shaklee's San Francisco headquarters. He comments, "In order to become successful in network marketing in a short period of time you need to not just work hard, but you need to work smart. This is where networking comes into play."
He further suggests that to find other people who want to start their own distributorships under you, join or start a net working organization. "What you're looking for," he says, "is a person with a desire for their own business and the proper timing for them to act upon this desire."
These according to Mark are the keys to a successful network marketing plan are:
- Have a unique, top quality product line that will gain a loyal customer base.
- The product line should be consumable and will be reordered.
- The company should offer ample rewards and income to motivate the independent.
- The company must have integrity and financial strength to last into the future.
A major portion of the services and goods sold in the United States is sold through network/multilevel channels. Major corporations use MLM sales forces. Most corporations, major or minor have embraced a concept based on good old networking principals.
Life Is A Selling Network
Network marketer Mark Moroney says ; " Life is a net work. My favorite come-back to the individual who says, I can't sell,' is, 'Your whole life is selling.' As a child, you sold your mother on when to feed you. You sold your teacher on the idea that you were a good student. You sold your spouse on the idea that he or she should marry you, and you'll probably sell the boss on letting you keep your job or giving you a raise."
