A FRESH LOOK AT MULTI-LEVEL MARKETING

MLM? It hasn’t been all that long since just hearing those three letters would make me cringe. How many times had I tried that way of making a living, only to fail miserably and, in the process, drive most my friends and relatives away from me?

It has a more user-friendly name these days and you may know it better as Network Marketing. I have to admit that this has a much nicer ring to it. However, I tend to think that a skunk by any other name would smell the same.

But then, I also have to admit that the concept of direct selling seems to make sense. There can be no better way to sell any product than one-on-one, or face-to-face. I'll also concede that there are definitely some products that just can’t be sold off the shelf in a store; products whose particular brand of mystique requires some explanation or personal testimony to show why they are so much better than all those apparently similar products on that shelf.

And who among us can deny having a unique network of friends, relatives and acquaintances who love us and/or trust us not to steer them wrong. Now, add to that the fact that each of those in your network has his or her own unique network of people whom you have never met and whom, if not for your mutual friend, you probably never would meet. And, theoretically, this process should go on ad infinitum.

So, what’s wrong with this picture? Why is it that only 3% of those getting into an MLM succeed in making the big bucks, while the other 97% only succeed in alienating all those near and dear to them? What, for that matter, is wrong with the three foot rule? This is the concept of pitching everyone who comes within three feet of you. It certainly sounds like a way to sell a big bunch of whatever it is that you’re selling.

After many years of beating the bushes in this way while hawking a variety of products ranging from soap to soup, I suddenly realized that I was trying to push something on people who just were not in the market or, for that matter, not even interested in what had me so excited. Wouldn’t I do a whole lot better if I only sold to people who were actively looking for what I was selling? But how could I do that. It’s not like I had a store in the window of which I could display my wares, so passersby would see them and be enticed to come in and buy. Or did I?

That’s when I realized that about three feet away from where I’m sitting right now sits my computer, through which I can access the Internet. It was then that, in my mind’s eye, that computer screen turned into a store window with between two and three billion people passing by at any given time, day or night. All I had to do was dress up that Window Display, thereby enticing not all but some of them to come into the store, browse a bit and buy.

To that end I began studying the art of Attraction Marketing and finding ways to get people beating a path to my door for my products and business opportunities.

If you have had a similar experience, good or bad, and would like to add your comment, I'd love to hear about it.

F.D.A. APPROVAL: Is It Overrated?

What does the F.D.A. really approve and why?
Why are so many people so sick?

Don't even get me started on this one. If I ever had one issue I could call my pet peeve, this is it. The audacity of a government agency to dictate what a health food purveyor may and may not say about his product never fails to raise the hackles on the back of my neck.

It has the small business person, along with the largest of health product manufacturers, running scared. When I started selling a certain health drink I was told to be very careful about any claims I made for the product. The last thing the big boys at the top wanted was to have some snot-nosed new distributor making fantastic claims that it would cure something. All our statements had to be couched with such words and phrases as "some say," or "it's been said," and always it must be followed by a lengthy disclaimer like this one I used at the end of all my flyers: Disclaimer: This is a nutritional product and does not claim to cure any condition. The benefits described above are the results of getting the required daily amount of antioxidants and phytonutrients to help your immune system function properly and strengthen your entire body at the cellular level. This product does provide a simple and convenient delivery system to get those nutrients into your body on a regular basis. -w

It's enough to make a guy paranoid. I was truly starting to believe that were I to stand before a small group of potential distributors in my living room, hold up a lime (or a picture of a lime) and make the claim that this is a cure for scurvy, the feds would be raiding my living room, clapping me in irons, and hauling me away to Guantanamo Bay for the rest of my natural life.

So, you can imagine how I would feel whenever anyone would ask, "Is this approved by the FDA? I wouldn't want to take anything into my body that wasn't approved by that upstanding government agency." Yeah, right!

"It's been said" that the FDA isn't interested in approving food. They only want to approve drugs. Why? You can probably figure it out if you just think about it a while. You may think you pay a lot of money for food, but just compare that with what you pay for drugs. And what food comes with a long list of side effects like "may cause liver failure, kidney failure, stroke, heart attack, sudden death?" If these are the drugs they approve which ones do they disapprove?

The worst part of all of this is that the medical profession, made up of doctors who graduated Med School with altruistic dreams of helping down-trodden humanity to gain a healthier, disease free life, are now forced to work with their hands tied and may only prescribe what has been approved by the God of Medicine who is called by the name, FDA.

Well maybe that's not the worst part. Maybe that comes when I have something to offer that has helped people all over the world to a healthier lifestyle with fewer aches and pains, but a person can't try it without first consulting with his or her doctor to find out if it is compatible with the myriad of drugs they are now on. How did they get on those drugs? Probably from other drugs, prescribed for what may have been a minor problem, at first, but led to several side effects calling for other drugs, which came with their own laundry list of side effects. And the beat goes on. Maybe that's why so many people today are suffering from so many diseases.

What do you think? If you have had a similar experience, good or bad, I'd love to hear your comments.

GOOD HEALTH IS NOTHING TO BRAG ABOUT

What I am about to reveal to you is not an idle boast, but neither is it something to be proud of. For more than twenty months my wife, Nell, and I have enjoyed the pleasure that only comes from perfect physical and mental health. I’m not ashamed of that, but at the same time I’ve recently learned not to be proud of it to the point of loudly proclaiming, “BRING ON YOUR GERM WARFARE, I AM IMPERVIOUS TO BUGS!”

This was a lesson that did not come easily. I’m finally now recovering from a virus that’s had me laid low for the past two weeks; or as you Brits would say, a fortnight— fourteen full days and nights of absolute misery. I know now, however, I had it coming to me. Enjoying great health is one thing; rubbing it into the noses of those who are sick is quite another, and I’m afraid I was getting to that point.

Whenever we would hear that one of our friends had caught a bug and then gave it to the rest of his family, we would naturally be reminded of the healthy life we were enjoying with MaxGXL. But instead of thinking, “There, but for the grace of God, go I,” we tried to never miss a chance to share that thought on a Get-Well card. It took getting sick and passing it on to Nell for me to realize how callous I was becoming. I had forgotten what it felt like to be sick. All of my friends know, well enough, that Nell and I promote MaxGXL as the answer to any health problem that could have been fended off by a stronger immune system. Wanting to remind them of that, while they are sick, borders on what you might want to do to a forgetful puppy when he’s had an accident on the rug.

Seeing my poor wife in her misery, my heart went out to her. I was guessing she might have gotten a bit lax in taking her MaxGXL regularly. That may have been the case, but the compassion and empathy I was feeling kept me from mentioning it to her. That was the start of my lesson. The rest of it came when I remembered that I was just as sick as she was. Had I also gotten lax with the Max? Well, maybe— just a little. But there had to be something else involved. I had forgotten what it felt like to be sick. Would I have been as compassionate with her were I not suffering as much as she was? I needed that reminder.

June Carter once told a story on her husband, Johnny Cash; about how she caught him one night before a show, strutting like a peacock in front of the full-length mirror in their dressing room. Being a kind and supportive wife, she wanted to suggest that he might be losing some of the humility that had so endeared him to his fans from the start. She was still trying to find just the right words to broach the subject when a knock on the door said it was time to get out on-stage. They were a great team together and this night was no exception. The show ended to a standing ovation and two curtain calls. There might have been three but during the second one, with Johnny bowing broadly and deeply from center stage, a rip was heard, his face turned beet-red, and he had to back out between the curtains.

Three minutes later in the dressing, June could see that he was visibly upset over being embarrassed in front of the crowd sand was threatening to take it out on the wardrobe people for making his pants too tight. She thought about what she had seen before the show, looked him square in the eye and said, “Don’t blame them, Hon, it was the Good Lord who split your britches tonight.”

I guess we can all get a little too big for our britches sometimes. If you ever get to feeling so proud of yourself for having the sense to use MaxGXL that you lose compassion for those not as fortunate; or so proud of the good health you enjoy, that you forget to thank the one who provides everything we need to live healthy lives, even in this polluted world— well, don’t be surprised if you someday get your britches split.

So, lets call this a two-fold lesson: 1^st, Never get lax with your Max, — 2^nd, Never forget who to thank for it!