Learning how to network and how to network effectively are two different things.
Whether you’re trying to build your personal brand or your business, the key to success lies in developing these habits and putting them into practice in all aspects of your life.
Here are the 7 habits of highly effective network marketing professionals.
1.Create Your Culture.
Your success in network marketing depends on your ability to lead. You’re not just a salesperson, but also a teacher, motivator and, ultimately, an inspiration.
Whether you’re building a team or simply working on yourself and your own personal development journey, you can’t be effective if you don’t have passion and belief in what you’re doing.
Have a clear understanding of what success looks like to you—and then go do it! If that means creating your own culture from scratch and starting from scratch yourself, so be it! People need to know what they can expect from their leaders in order to achieve any level of success themselves.
They won’t follow someone who doesn’t know where he or she is going. So, make sure you have a clearly defined vision for where you want to take your organization and how people will get there with you.
2.Create Goals.
One way to help you hit your target is to set a goal for yourself. Maybe you want to earn a certain amount of money or recruit a certain number of people.
Maybe you want to get in shape, or improve your customer service skills. You can even make it personal, with goals like reconnecting with friends and family or celebrating each month by having dinner together as a family.
By setting these kinds of goals, you’ll create something that is directly tied to how successful your network marketing business will be.
If you take care of your goals first — what top leaders call eating what you kill — then success is all but guaranteed.
The next step is to figure out what steps you need to take in order to achieve those goals. This requires planning, which we’ll cover below.
3.Be Persistent.
It takes time to build a business. Some leaders make an income in their first month, but many more take months or even years to hit their stride.
It’s important to focus on your long-term goals, not your short-term wins. If you want to grow a profitable network marketing business, you have to be persistent and work hard for it—in other words, hustle .
You won’t get anywhere without doing so, and it will only get harder as time goes on.
This is why we recommend that new network marketers set monthly performance benchmarks for themselves; if you don’t know how much effort is required to meet them, how can you expect to do so? As you continue down your path of success, keep track of what works and what doesn’t.
This way, when someone asks about your journey (or tries to emulate it), they can see exactly what got you there.
4.Give Back.
Whether you’re looking to expand your business or simply your sphere of influence, give back to your community. Volunteer or donate time and resources. Even a small effort can have a huge impact on your local community.
(Bonus: it’s also a great networking opportunity.) Join forces with other volunteers for larger projects; use social media to raise awareness about causes you care about; and search for volunteer opportunities in your area.
After all, helping people creates positive energy that will come back around in ways you might not expect. So help others before asking for help from others! And remember—volunteering is just one way to give back.
Think outside of yourself by giving away something else you have plenty of—knowledge! Share what you know through blogging, writing e-books, hosting workshops, and doing speaking engagements.
Remember: Giving away information isn’t giving away profits; it’s building relationships and credibility as an expert in your field—all valuable assets when growing a business.
5.Focus on Quality.
Most network marketers have a natural tendency to focus on quantity, rather than quality.
Unfortunately, that’s both ineffective and embarrassing for your downline. Take time to study what makes for effective social media posts and maximize your engagement with each post you make.
The more effort you put into creating quality content, the more effective it will be at growing your business.
Quality isn’t just about producing something amazing – it’s also about producing something useful.
You’ll want to start by crafting engaging titles, tags, descriptions and calls-to-action that actually resonate with your target audience. Once you’ve got those figured out, take some time to brainstorm ideas for images and videos.
Even if they don’t end up being used in your marketing campaigns, they can help boost awareness around your brand or product launch – or simply entertain your followers!
When done right, great visuals can give people a much clearer picture of what you’re trying to achieve through social media marketing: brand awareness and credibility, thought leadership in your industry (or niche), links back to landing pages or websites…the list goes on!
6.Stay Open.
Networking is, by its very nature, an in-your-face type of activity. You’re trying to connect with as many people as possible—so it’s natural that some will want nothing to do with you.
But, if you’re not careful, you can let these rejections become discouraging and close off your network. Rather than thinking about it as a we vs.
them mentality, remember that a closed door doesn’t mean someone has anything against you personally; most people don’t even think about their networks in such black-and-white terms.
Rather than turn away from a closed door or brush off a setback, see what opportunities may lie beyond it: Perhaps there’s someone else who could use your product or service?
Maybe there’s another angle for approaching your contact? And even if it seems like things are at a dead end, you never know when something might open up again.
Remember: Most successful businesses didn’t happen overnight. Even big successes took time to develop into what they are today. So, keep networking and stay open!
7.Set a Good Example.
People are more likely to follow your lead if they think you’re an expert. The best way to show that you know what you’re doing is by successfully running your own network marketing business.
This also helps establish trust and credibility, which are absolutely crucial in any relationship—professional or personal.
If a potential customer hears about all of your successes, instead of hearing about all of your failures, they’ll be much more likely to want to partner with you and build a business with you.
You also never know who might be watching; someone who could one day replace your position within the company could easily be within earshot during your next sales call or when talking at an event (which is why many networkers have started using video conferencing!).
So don’t just talk about how great you are—prove it!
Conclusion.
It’s a cliche, but you really do have to walk your talk and live by those rules for a period before deciding whether network marketing is for you.
You need to prove yourself first before others will believe that you can follow through with your talk. Follow these habits for at least 3 months; it takes time to build credibility.
If you do that, there’s a good chance that you’ll be successful as a network marketer down the road! Good luck!
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