Work At Home Business Options

Archive for August, 2009

When you join a Direct Sales Company, you are often told to start marketing your business to your warm market.

For those of you who don’t know what that means…it means making a list of your family and friends, the people that you personally know. Your next step is to start contacting them and pitching your new business to them.

This is a good idea to get you started, however…you can not rely on your ‘warm market’ to make your business a success.

All great network marketers will tell you that you need to step outside of your warm market (comfort zone) and market your business to people you don’t know. To do this…you will need to advertise, market and network your business to strangers.

If you need some ideas on how to advertise or network your business, you can find some specific posts here on our blog on those subjects to help get you started.

The most important thing you can do for your home Direct Sales business is to think ‘outside’ of your warm market. Get out of your comfort zone…make some new friends, get involved in your community and join some business networking groups.

As you expand your horizons, you are expanding your business. Friends and family can only carry you and your business so far…in the end, it’s up to you to make your business flourish.

~Shelly~

When it comes to promoting your business online, I see way too many people promoting their businesses the wrong way. Here are a few things you need to be aware of in regards to spam.

1. Do not join online forum boards aka work at home mom communities to just spam business ads. If you do this, you will be labled as a spammer by everyone who participates in the wahm communities.

2. You never send out sales promotions or business opportunity information to people via email, unless they have specifically asked for the information. Manually adding folks to your email list is not the way to go. Furthermore, sending out all your business information to people who are in your personal address book is another big mistake.

3. If you are participating on social networking sites such as facebook, myspace, linked-in and twitter and do nothing but post business information…again you will be labled as a spammer. You never send a private message via a social networking site with business information in it…to someone who didn’t request it.

These days I am seeing way too many home business professionals marketing and advertising thier businesses the wrong way.

The quickest way to ruin your online business reputation is to run around spamming other people.

Take the time out of your schedule to learn and educate yourself on the proper way to advertise, market and network your home business online.

~Shelly~

Here is a great recipe that is healthy for you.

3 large garlic cloves, chopped
1 sweet onion, cut 1/2 inch chunks
1/2 each green, red, yellow pepper cut 1/2 inch chunks
2 large tomatoes cut in chunks
25 snow peas, cut in half
10 basil leaves, rolled and diced
500 ml whipping cream
*Rotini pasta or other short pasta
Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

*Depending on how you will have this, side dish or main dish you can make as little or as much pasta as you want.

Cook pasta. Microwave peppers and snow peas for about 1 minute and a half.

Saute garlic and onions, add salt. Add peppers, snow peas and tomatoes and continue to saute. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add whipping cream and let it reduce (you may not want to add this all at once in case you reduce it too much). It will reduce fairly quickly so keep an eye on it. You want enough liquid in there so when you add the pasta and parmesan cheese it won’t soak it all up and become dry.

Once reduced, add pasta, parmesan cheese and basil. Mix well until pasta is coated.

You can serve it with cracked pepper on top and/or sprinkled with more parmesan cheese.

Are you being honest in regards to your home business? If not, you really should be.

I think for most of us, we practice our businesses with honesty. However, I have been coming across others who are in a home business who are being dishonest.

I have seen people lie about how long they have been in business, how they work their business and how much they are making (income) with their home business.

Lying to your customers, clients and/or potential recruits will get you absolutely no where in the long run. Sure, you might get a little something by being dishonest now…but it certainly doesn’t pay for the long term.

A good solid home business is built on you being honest with yourself and those who you do business with.

Shelly

Summer is over and it’s time to get back to school. This time can be stressful for many families as they all try to adjust to new routines. You can lessen this stress and set up some guidelines by sitting down with your children for a family discussion.

Here are some important things you should be discussing with your children, before they head back to school this fall.

1. School Bus Safety – It is important to speak to your child about what kind of behavior you expect from him or her while they are at the bus stop or riding on the school bus.

2. Classroom Behavior – Let your child know what kind of behavior you expect them to exhibit while at school. All teachers expect different things from each child, remind your child to be respectful of others at all times. I think this is a good time to bring up the topic of bullying with your child. Let them know how to report this to their school officials and to you, should they know of any children who are being bullied or those who are doing the bullying.

3. Homework and Grades – If you expect your children to follow a homework routine, now is the time to outline that routine with them. I found it helpful to let our daughter know up front what the consequences would be if she did not complete homework assignments on time, or if she got unacceptable grades.

4. Stranger Danger – Your child will come into contact with many people while involved with school activities or while attending classes. It is important to go over with him or her all of the safety precautions that they need to know to protect themselves from stranger danger.

5. Family Emergency – When our daughter was young, we gave her a new family password every few months. If a family emergency would occur and we would need to send someone to the school to pick her up, they would have to provide the secret family password to her before she would even leave the school office with that particular person. Even if your child knows the person who is picking them up, it is important for that person to provide the secret family password to your child.

Heading back to school doesn’t have to be a stressful time for you and your family. Take the time out of your busy schedule and communicate with your children about what you expect from them this school year. It is important to be flexible and to have an open door policy in regards to communication.

Copyright © 2009 By Shelly Hill

I have been working in Direct Sales since 1989 and I have learnt a lot over those years as to what it takes to be a successful Direct Sales Recruiter. I have been one of the top 10 in recruiting in our Direct Sales Unit since 2003.

One question I am often asked is, how do you manage to get so many recruits? My reply is simple, I did my homework first on what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to talking to potential recruit leads.

Here are some recruiting tips that I have learnt over the years.

1. Never over-hype the business opportunity! Some people are leary of those who over-hype any business opportunity, making it sound too good to be true can scare people off. Always give straight and truthful facts about your companies business opportunity.

2. When talking to a possible recruit via phone or in person, always speak clearly, do not use slang words and make sure you sound like you are excited to be talking to them about your Home Business Opportunity. Try not to have other distractions going on at the same time in the background ie. kids screaming, hubby yelling etc. The new possible recruit deserves your undivided attention.

3. Allow the person you are speaking with to to ask you questions. During the conversation at several points, make sure you say “Do you have any questions for me?” then go on and answer them.

4. Make sure you educate yourself about the current New Consultant Specials that your company is running so you can explain them to the possible new recruit. You should inform your new potential recruit of all costs in starting this home business along with normal ongoing costs such as reordering of catalogs, monthly website fee’s, order form costs, mandatory quota’s and so forth.

5. I like to end my conversations with “I would like for you to think about all of this and you can contact me again if you have any questions for me” and let them know how they can contact you again via email, phone, mail or in person type of contact. Let them know when you are available ie. Your schedule.

6. After a few days or a week if you do not hear back from them, you can initiate contact again to see if they have any questions for you. Never assume they are not interested, sometimes they get busy with other things so always follow up with them at least one additional time.

7. I keep a list of possible recruits, sometimes its just not feasible for them to join right now ie. money commitments, family commitments and so forth. The next time we run a good new consultant special, I pull my list and initiate contact with them again. This has worked several times for me in getting new recruits! Just because they say no now, doesn’t mean you will get another no in a few weeks!

8. I try to connect with all recruits on a personal level too. I tell them why I joined and started my own home business, a little about myself and why this company has worked for me. This gives them a personal connection. I also ask if they have children or if they are married and how this business can work for them around their family obligations and so forth.

9. Always be honest when recruiting! Don’t lie and say you are making thousands of dollars! Let them know that with any business or job, it does take consistent work. Hard Work does pay off!

10. After I get a new recruit, I always follow up! I like to email them and let them know I am available to answer questions or to help them get started any way I can. I also like to snail mail them a Thank You card with my personal contact info inside it. I always make myself available at any time to answer any of their questions or to offer help when they need it.

11. Consistent Contact with New Recruits is essential for them to stay in it for the long haul. Keep in contact with them via phone, email, postal mail, team meetings etc. This keeps them connected to you and well informed about the business they are now involved in.

Remember, When you recruit…its also your job to help them get started by answering any questions they have. You just don’t sign them up and never contact them again. That makes for bad business relationships! The more help you offer and the more connection you make with them the better recruit they will be for you!

Copyright © 2007 By Shelly Hill

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