Direct Sales Team News

Team Online Parties

2007-09-19T22:50:00.000-05:00

Keeping your team motivated can be a difficult task sometimes, but
oh-so-very important. Looking for a new and unique way to give your
team that boost it needs? Read on ...

Instead of a traditional online party or a team meeting, how about
combining the two? Hold a Team Online Party. By doing this you'll
accomplish quite a few things:

First and foremost, you'll motivate your team with a fun and
unique atmosphere.

Teach your team more about your products and review important
information such as company policies, procedures etc.

Teach members recruiting and sales techniques.

Help your team obtain business building supplies.

The first thing you'll want to do is choose an online party room. We
highly recommends MomChats.com.

Next you'll want to choose a couple of dates and times that you have
available and contact your team members to vote on a day and time
that works for them. You'll want to try to satisfy as many members
as possible, but remember that there's a good chance that you won't
satisfy everyone.

Once you've picked a date, chosen your room, booked your party and
invited your team members, you'll want to start planning your party
games.

Again, you can choose traditional online party games with a twist.
If your policies and procedures are not listed online, you might
want to request your team members to "bring" them along to the
party. Here are a couple game ideas to get you started:

Trivia
- One of your games could be as simple as simply asking questions
directly from your manual about company policies, procedures etc and
have your members answer them. The team member who answers the most
correctly wins.

Scavenger Hunt
- Another idea would be to help your team become more familiar with
your catalogs or your company websites by holding a scavenger hunt
for products. Have them tell you what page such and such is located
or how much a certain product costs. Again, the member with the most
correct wins.

For the prizes, you'll want to take this opportunity to let them win
business building items such as information products (Ex. ebooks),
business cards and other items needed for their business such as
samples. You can get very nice looking and very inexpensive business
cards from Vista Print as well as many other items such as
promotional magnets, calendars and stationary. Buy samples by the
bulk from your company and break them down into smaller quantities
for prizes. Ebooks with information about home businesses make a
wonderful and very inexpensive prize that will continue to give back
to you. Remember, the more successful your team members are, the
more successful you are too.

You'll also want to take this time to congratulate team members for
any accomplishments. Don't forget to congratulate for even the
smallest accomplishments. This is a perfect time for a little slap
on the back and celebrate.

Just remember to be creative. The more creative you are, the more
fun it will be. The more fun you make it, the more successful it
will be. You'll want to put in as much to planning this as you would
a traditional online party.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your
next team online party such as more game and prize ideas, visit
http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/team-online-party.html

----------------------------------------

The Customer is Sometimes Rude

2007-09-15T11:02:00.000-05:00

Business is not all fun and games. If you are running your own business, you absolutely must have a thick skin. Being easily hurt or upset isn't going to get you anywhere.

Imagine for a moment you holding a home party. As the guests are looking at catalogs, one says "Look at this lamp, it's so UGLY!". You note which one they are looking at, and realize you have one just like it in your own home.

You have two options here. Either you get rude right back at her, or you offer to help her find something more her taste. While the second option is obviously the better way to go, sometimes we tend to react on instincts first.

The same is true while networking and being active in business communities online. While these places shouldn't be the main source of customers, know you WILL sell to other business owners. If you react rude to another WAHM, you are going to lose sales pretty fast. Not only are you going to lose out on a possible sale from the person you offended, but also others reading it too.

Customers and business owners are going to have opinions. No matter if it's on your website, your products, or your method of marketing. Some comments may be constructive critisism, others may be down right rude. Regardless, fighting back is NEVER going to look good on your part.

Granted there are always going to be those who will never buy, but that still doesn't mean you should be rude back to them. Word travels regardless of who they are, and your business is going to be hurt. Always keep in mind that bad news travels at least twice as fast as good news.

Bottom line - the next time you feel someone is being rude, grit your teeth and smile. Getting down to their level never helps. Besides, don't forget, you never know who's watching. You're a business owner and your reputation is on the line.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com.

----------------------------------------

Find Your Marketing Strength - Part 2

2007-09-06T18:21:00.000-05:00

In part one we talked about why focus in marketing is so important. This part goes into more detail about various forms of marketing, and why it's so important they be focused on.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Possible one form of marketing that requires the most focus. Just throwing in a few keywords or doing link exchanges without a purposes will get you nowhere in the search engines. SEO must be learned, practiced, and studied. A site is not optimized, a page is. So you need to work on optimizing one page at a time.

Is it worth the time? Absolutely! If this is something which interests you, and you enjoy writing content. If not, you might do better with another form of marketing.

2. Blogs
You may have been told blogs are a great way to pull in traffic. This is true. But it's another form of marketing which requires dedication. Setting up a blog and putting up a few posts a year isn't going to help much. If you use blogging as a marketing tool, be ready to post to your blog at LEAST once a week (more if you want the blog to really help your business).

Blogs make great "search engine food" because they are pure content and updated on a regular basis. This form of marketing works well if you enjoy SEO as well, since they can be easily focused on together. Just like SEO though, if you don't enjoy writing content this isn't for you.

3. Article Marketing
If for some reason a blog is out of the question, article marketing may be a form of marketing for you. Similar to blogging, you need to be able to write. Not quite as much as blogging, but still several articles a month are required for this form of marketing to work.

Basically what you'll do is write articles related to your business. Pick out a few of the top article directories on the net and submit your article. If done on a regular basis, you will soon have a steady flow of traffic to your site. This form works especially well for those attempting to gain subscribers to a newsletter.

4. Forum Marketing
A newer concept in online marketing, but still one which can have a huge impact on your business. In part one we mentioned one of the "basics" of business was some involvement in communities (meaning you are a member of 2 or 3 message boards or groups, and offer advice at least once a week). Forum Marketing (or "network marketing") takes that a step further.

Instead of just stopping in occasionally, this is one of the only tasks you do. You aren't just a member of a few communities, but rather 10 or more. For those who have been told "don't spend all your time at groups and boards", well you will love that we've just given you permission to do just that. If of course you love to help people, share ideas, and spend all your day chatting. Yes this really IS a form of marketing!

The idea behind this is your are making a name for yourself at any given community. You aren't spamming them, but rather becoming a respected member. Although for it to be absolutely beneficial, you must be involved with a community that's also your target market. If you have trouble finding a community, start one. Either a message board or yahoo group works just fine. Actively chatting with your target market is a fantastic form of marketing!

5. Paid Advertising
While some may shy away from this form of marketing just because of the cost, others have built an entire business with nothing but paid ads. Those who enjoy math will flock to this form, since it requires figuring out your return on investment (ROI). The goal is to spend less than you make.......and use money to make money.

It too requires focus, despite what some may think. The rewards can be huge if you unlock this form of marketing though. Testing is required to see which ads pull in the most money for you. You also need to search for various types of paid advertising which will earn you the most ROI.

There are many, many more forms of marketing online and offline as well. We've only just scratched the surface! As we've mentioned in both parts of these articles, focus is required for ANY form of marketing.

However, it is acceptable to focus on more than one IF they are enjoyable and successful for you. As long as you are keeping a focus on what works, your business will succeed.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com.

----------------------------------------

Find Your Marketing Strength - Part 1

2007-08-30T12:01:00.000-05:00

There are hundreds of different ways to market your business both online and offline. While it's good in the beginning to test out various types of marketing, you'll eventually going to want to focus on how you market best.

Finding your strength in marketing is going to have a huge impact on your business. You'll be able to spend your time focused ONLY on what works, instead of scattered in a various directions.

Also, when focused on just two or three different forms of marketing, you are able to gain the maximum benefits from those forms. When your focus is scattered, you aren't going to benefit near as much.

Let us give you an example. Let's say you are good at writing articles, and they have proved to help your business. Not just "alright" at writing, but you can write several articles a day without problems. You spend half your time on the articles, and the rest of the time doing "busy" activities that aren't beneficial to your business. Had you spent all that time on articles, how much further would your business be right now?

Here's another example. You enjoy learning about search engine optimization, but haven't quite fully learned it just yet. Instead of learning more, you throw a few keywords on your website then move on to something else. Will just a few keywords help? Absolutely not. Instead of focusing on that form of marketing, you've only done a small part thus making it almost a pointless task.

Before going any further let us say this - there is NOTHING wrong with seeking out new forms of marketing. However, most marketing is not a "quick fix" or a "set and forget". It takes time to make any form of marketing work in your favor. But if you don't enjoy it nor focus on it, it's never going to work for you.

Also realise there are certain "basics" to any marketing plan that you are going to need to learn. Websites, newsletters, and some imvolvement in communities (we say "some" because "full" involvment is a marketing form all on it's own) are all things you must do.

Bottom line is - marketing is just like chosing your business. Success comes with passion and ability to focus. Now that you understand this, in part two we'll discuss some of the various ways to market and why focus in each are important.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com.

----------------------------------------

Motivation - Where to Find It

2007-07-18T15:19:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank

While we all have our own ways of finding motivation, sometimes we all need a little shove. We'll tell you what gets us moving when you don't feel like doing anything at all.

One of the perks of owning a business is working your own hours. However, it can be very tempting to just say "I don't feel like working today". You do have the option to do that without "losing your job". But every day you take off, the motivation to work on your business gets a little less.

Before you know it, your motivation is completely gone. You don't feel like working at all, and start to feel your business is failing. Well of course it is if you aren't doing anything!
Obviously what you need to do is get your motivation levels back to normal. You have to WANT to work on your business to succeed. The best way to find motivation is actually pretty simple...

Read.

When you don't feel like working directly on your business (or really don't know what to do), this is the best time to do something indirect. Read, learn about new ideas, soak up information, and find new projects.

Read until you find the spark, and run with it. Which it WILL hit, simply because new ideas get us excited. Business owners love to be busy, or we wouldn't be building a business to begin with.

Visit your favorite WAHM resource websites. First you'll want to browse around the article / resource sections and - yup, you guessed it - read. Read the articles and make notes - no, not mental notes. Open a word processing document or even better, pull out that old notebook and pen. Make notes of anything that jumps out at you. Before you know it, you're note taking session will turn into a "brain dump" listing all your ideas for your next project.

After you've read all the articles you want to, and you're looking for some more motivation ... hop on over to your favorite WAHM message boards. Browse around older topics and join in on some of the conversations. Visit your favorite blogs and read what they have been doing, or resources they recommend.

So the next time you feel your motivation lacking, go and learn something new or review things you've already learned. The main idea is to keep yourself involved one way or another. Keep active and the motivation will stay with you. You'll be surprised how fast your business grows with motivation!

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

----------------------------------------

Let Them Play

2007-06-28T08:06:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank

The purpose of a craft show or home party is to attract customers. You are also giving them the chance to touch, play, or try on the products. Telling them not to touch is going to have them moving on as quickly as possible.

Here's an example as to how to drive customers away:

We attend quite a few craft shows. It's not always possible to find sitters for the entire day, so my kids are with me sometimes for part of it. They always seem to find the Discovery Toys rep first thing.

Now I'm a parent that watches my kids. I tell them not to touch. I pull them away from the table, especially when I know I'm not going to buy that day. Our regular DT rep who we see on a regular basis always says "hey they're fine, that's what the toys are here for!". Well still, I want to keep her booth open for children of paying customers.

The DT rep we saw this weekend couldn't have been more different. My kids wandered over to the table right off the bat. I was right behind telling them not to touch and trying to herd them out of there. Even still, the rep told my kids to leave certain things alone and put them back. Not really rude, but repeating what I was already saying. This didn't make me happy in the least, because I WAS watching my kids.

Now not only did she upset a qualified potential customer (parent with young children), but she failed to really show off her products. Our normal DT reps knows the more kids playing the more parents it attracts. If space permits, she'll even set up an extra table specifically for the kids to play.

When you see your kid interested in a toy you know is educational, you are more likely to buy. Plus when parents come to collect their kids, our normal rep uses that time to talk about the company and products. Not like this other rep who spent that time scolding the kids for touching toys (how dare they, right?).

At a craft show or home party you aren't just showing the products. You are demonstrating. You are letting potential customers try them out. Candles you let them smell. Food you let them sample. Scrapbooking materials they make a project with. Pampered Chef you cook with. Bath products you have samples sitting out to try. Other products you let them pick up and touch.

Sometimes it's not so easy to let them try products before buying, but you've got to do your best to let them. For example, I once saw a scrapbooking rep at a craft show who had fancy scissors sitting on the table with scrap paper. She encouranged people to use them.

You don't just show the product, but how it's used. Seeing it in action is the best way to push a potential customer right to their checkbook. Even if kids are touching items you don't want them to, just grit your teeth and smile. Let the parents take care of their own children.....and of course, buy from you.

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help at offline events, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.html

-------------------------------------------------

Craft Shows: Pay and Stay

2007-06-20T16:51:00.000-05:00

If you pay for a table at a craft show, it only makes sense to show up. Sure things come up, but you should always try your best to make it. You should also try your best to stay for the entire show.

Over the weekend we attended an outdoor craft show. Our instructions stated we were allowed to set up on Friday night, and stay as late as we wanted to Saturday evening. The schedule of events showed activities clear up to 10pm at night, so we knew we would be there until at least dark.

The tables next to us were obviously new at craft shows. Not only did they not show up until Saturday, but a few left in the afternoon. Sure the sales slowed down a bit, but we knew it would pick up later on that day. The schedule was given to all vendors ahead of time, so we all knew it was coming.

What baffled me the most was what one vendor said to me as she packed up at 2pm. When asked if she was leaving already, she stated "yeah, we have another show tonight".

What??

Now why would you pay for a table at two different places? Not only did they not set up Friday, but they left early Saturday too. They missed out on all those sales in the evening, even though they paid for the table. Right now I'm sure they are thinking they won't return to this show because of lack of sales. Of course they didn't make enough sales if they were only there half the show!

If you want to make the most of your craft show, you MUST be there for the entire show. Don't show up late and don't leave early. Outdoor events are going to have slow periods depending on the type of event and what's scheduled.

Also, don't overbook yourself. You can only be in one place at one time. Paying for two different events on the same day is just throwing profits away.

Bottom line is, if you pay for a table, stay there!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help at offline events, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.html

------------------------------------------------

6 Steps to a Successful Home Party

2007-06-14T11:20:00.000-05:00

Everyday someone is coming up with a new way to market your direct sales business (which of course is great). Keeping your business interesting and fresh is important. However, don't forget the tactics that made direct sales companies (aka home party plans) popular.

Home parties are not only an excellent way to showcase your products, but are also a great deal of fun. There's nothing more entertaining than getting a bunch of people (usually women) together to show and test your merchandise. Hands on beats other tactics hands down time and time again!

Following a simply guideline can help you have successful home party that runs smoothly and everyone enjoys. The following guideline will give you the basic idea of how to do this and can easily be adjusted to fit your own tastes / needs.

Before the Guests arrive...
Be sure to arrive at your hostess's home about an hour or so before the start of your party to review any last minute details. Set up a refreshment table and re-arrange furniture if needed. Set up your display and do a quick review of the guest list. Review any before-party sales. Don't forget to lay out the catalogs, brochures and business cards!

Greeting the Guests...
Have the hostess warmly greet each guest as they arrive. Have her introduce you and engage in some general chit-chat. Ask them about themselves, what do they do, how do they know the hostess, do they have any children? Remember to smile!

The Ice Breaker...
Games are a perfect ice breaker. Play a game or two to make the guests feel welcome and comfortable. Make your games fun and with as much interaction with the guests as possible. Another good ice breaker is to thank your hostess for holding the party and giving her a gift. If you offer gifts to guests who bring friends; now's the time do hand them out.

The Presentation...
Start showing guests the items that you've brought for display and give a brief description that you've prepared before-hand on each one. Guests love hands-on viewing. After each description, hand the merchandise to the guests to get a better look and pass around. At the end of your presentation, discuss the opportunity for guests to become hostesses themselves and briefly discuss the rewards. Be sure at some point to open the floor to the guests for any questions, comments and/or concerns. At this time the hostesses should be doing any last minute preparations of the refreshments.

Finishing up Guest Orders...
Be prepared to help guests fill in their order forms and answer any questions about sales tax and shipping costs. It might not be a bad idea to bring along a calculator for quicker or more accurate order totals. Also be prepared to accept checks and let it be known who you'd prefer the checks to be written to. Make sure you thank each guest who purchases and give them a copy of the completed order form.

Ending the Show...
Once again you should thank the hostess for having the show. Be sure to thank each guest for coming as they leave whether they made a purchase or not. Don't forget to have all the needed information to contact guests after the party concerning their orders or potentially hosting a party themselves. And don't forget to have fun!

Remember, it's your party so get creative! The more fun your guests have ... the more chances you have of future bookings. Some simple planning and organization will open the door of opportunity wide open. Make sure you hold your head high, put on a smile and walk right in.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

----------------------------------------

3 SEO Tips for Direct Sales

2007-05-31T16:09:00.000-05:00

While this could easily turn into another "you need a website" article, it's really about search engine optimization for direct sales reps. It's just important to you (maybe even more so) than it is for others in different industries.

Before you read any further, know you are going to need your own website. There is no way around this, as you can't optimize a rep site. It looks identical to all the rest of the rep sites out there, and search engines hate identical.

1. Check your company terms
It's important you check with your company to make sure you can actually have your own site. It's also important you double check that you can use your company name. Being able to use a heavily searched for company name could be a huge asset if used right.

2. Use keyword phrases
Once you know you can build a site on your own with your company name, you need to come up with a list of keyword phrases. Keep in mind you will only use ONE keyword phrase per page. Each page needs to focus on just one set (a phrase) of keywords. Start here to find out what others are searching for:
http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/

3. Build incoming links
Write articles, use your signature line on forums, and seek out link exchanges. As long as you have links coming into your site, the search engines WILL index you automatically. Which is something you need to realize about search engines - they will crawl your site as long as you have quality content and links coming into your site. Do not fall for the "submit your site to 100s of search engines" scam. It happens automatically!

For more advanced search engine optimization work on your site, I highly suggest Cricket's SEO class at:
http://www.gnc-web-creations.com/seo-optimization.htm

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Are You Tracking?

2007-04-26T20:48:00.000-05:00

The first sale off your website comes in. You're so excited, everyone you know hears about it. Before you know you see another, and another. When you are asked where the visitor came from, you may shrug and think it's unimportant. What matters is you got paid, right?

WRONG.

One of the most important aspects of business is knowing what makes you sales and what doesn't. You end up wasting time and money repeating actions that don't make you money. If you knew where those visitors were coming from, then you could duplicate the efforts in that specific area.

Let's put this way. Say you run 10 ads in different places, each costing you $5 each. You make 10 sales from all those ads. To duplicate those results without tracking, you'd have to spend another $50. But if you tracked those visitors you would only spend more money on the ads that worked.

The same goes with other forms of advertising. Let's say you visit 5 message boards every day as your main method of advertising (which we don't recommend by the way). It brings you 5 sales a week. If you track your visitors you can easily see which message board is bringing the traffic, cutting the time you spend on message boards down to maybe 2 or 3 a day instead.

So what can you do to track your visitors?

Simply set up a stat tracker of some kind on your website. And yes, even if you are given a rep website from your company, you NEED a website. This is one of the reasons why you do. We can't stress this enough. Your online business will be VERY limited without your own website.

Tracking is very important to any online business. It doesn't matter what type of business you run, you absolutely need to know where your visitors are coming from to increase your sales.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Stop Being Lazy and Run Your Business

2007-04-05T10:24:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso and Anita DeFrank
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

This may be harsh words, but they need be said. Over the past few months we've noticed an epidemic of laziness. It needs to be stopped!

Let us explain a little more.

Quite often we see a post on a group or message board for someone looking for free advertising. Nothing wrong with that I suppose, we need all the exposure we can get on our sites. Not paying anything for it is even better. These posts are always followed by a slue of "me too". Again, this is understandable.

Now here's where the laziness kicks in.

In the past few weeks we've made some posts in search of link exchanges, articles, submissions, and partner exchanges. In other words, free advertising in exchange for several sites. The response? Slim to none.

What happen to all those who wanted free advertising? Did the word "in exchange" scare them away? If it did, then that's a shame. They all had the perfect opportunity to promote their business, but passed it up because in required them to do something. Something other than handing over their link of course.

Even worse, you tend to see the same people asking same questions on many boards. Questions such as "how do I promote my business?" or "I need to advertise, where do I start?". The answers are written all over the place, yet they aren't being read. Either that or it's being ignored because "it looks too hard to do".

Everyone seems to want that magical way to drive hundreds of visitors and sales to their site, without spending the time or money. Let's put this to rest once and for all - there IS no easy way to build your business. It takes time and/or money to build a solid buisness. What's more, no one is going to do it for you.

So while it may sound harsh, get to work! Put those suggestions and ideas for promotion to work. Get more involved with projects others are asking help for. Don't spend all day surfing boards looking for the easy way to succeed. The only place you are going to find success is within yourself!

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Is Lack of Focus Holding You Back?

2007-04-03T02:02:00.000-05:00

There are no shortage of marketing ideas out there. Online and offline, there's literally thousands of ways to promote your business. Although if your focus isn't on any of them, how will you succeed?

We admit it - we're guilty of having focus issues. When a new idea or business comes along, it's hard not to get excited. You drop what you are doing and get right to work on it. Unfortunately that excitement fades within a few weeks, and you are back to square one. Before you know it, there's tons of unfinished projects and half-way promoted businesses.

Lack of focus is holding you back.

Here are some tips to help you stay focused:

- Set Goals
Give yourself goals or specific things you want to accomplish before you stop on any given project.

- Set Hours
If time is an issues, set specific work hours. Don't go anywhere between those certain hours. Even if it's just 3 hours a day, it's something.

- One Project/Business
Instead of splitting your focus among many businesses, keep your focus on just one or two businesses or projects. Do whatever time allows you, not just what sounds interesting at the time.

- Wait a Week
If you spot a new business that sounds interesting, don't jump on it. Focus on your original business for awhile. If it still sounds exciting a week or two later, then it might be something worth giving a second look.

There are other ways to keep focus, but these are just a few.

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Free Start Up vs. Kit Requirement

2007-03-15T13:32:00.000-05:00

Some people won't join a company unless it's free to join. To be very blunt, you're better off without them on your team. These people are what some might call freebie seekers. Not that there is necessarily anything wrong with this. We all love a freebie, right? However, this really isn't something you need on your team. Why you ask?

When someone isn't required to invest at least a little bit of money, then they're also not required to put any thought into it either. I mean after all it's free, what's the loss? Since there's no need to invest any money, there isn't any. So they jump in head first without learning anything more than the "free sign up" only to find out later that the company isn't a fit after all. And think about this ... How many free companies have you joined simply for the discount? When you join a company for the discount, you really don't have any interest in marketing the business at all, do you? Now keep in mind, this isn't always true. Not by any means.

It's been my experience that when people are required to put a little money into it, they're more likely to actually think about it before they join. They will likely read all the fine print of becoming a consultant. Hopefully they'll actually make a purchase to test the ordering process, the shipping costs and time, the quality of the product and most importantly do a little research to see the marketability in their area. In other words, are they going to be able to sell this product in their area? How many other people are selling the same product or something similar?

Another point to keep in mind is that there is now an investment. They at least want to make that money back, right? There's more than likely a spouse or other family member who is going to expect them to at least give it a good try because there is now an investment.

Most companies offer start up kits that are perfect to give your business a jumpstart including some of their best sellers, samples, brochures, catalogs etc etc. Of course what each company offers is different but for the most part, this is generally what is included. Some companies have expensive start ups. However, most companies offer these products as greatly reduced prices making it very affordable to start your own business.

With that said, it brings me to my next thought. If your prospects can't afford an inexpensive start up kit, they may want to consider getting a j.o.b first and start their new business on the side. It takes time and money before your business will start making business. Against the popular belief, your business cannot survive on free advertising/promotion methods alone. You're going to have to invest some kind of money at some point. At the very least, you need business cards and catalogs. That list itself, can be longer however, you can at least get a small start there.

So to wrap up a long story, having a business that requires recruits to pay to start is not a bad thing. Happy recruiting!

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

How to Train Your Team

2007-03-07T13:45:00.000-05:00

Your downline is one of your most important parts of direct sales.
Your sales come first of course, but having a well trained team
selling for you can account for half your income.

The following are three simple ways to train your team, while
building your own income at the same time.

1. Hold Meetings
Use meetings not just to direct your team, but let it be open for
ideas as well. Holding monthly meetings to talk about the month is a
great way to help everyone as a whole. Talk about who sold what and
where, and any special tips anyone might like to share. It's a great
time to answer questions as well!

2. Teach by Example
If you aren't selling products yourself, this needs to be at the top
of your list. Just as children pick up things from their parents,
your team is doing the same.

3. Newsletters
Publish a weekly or monthly newsletter. Include expert articles
designed to help motivate and train your team. You can also include
a summary of your meeting as well, for those that didn't make it.

--------------------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank specialize in helping direct sales
consultants succeed with their business. Need help building your
team? You can find expert articles to train your team at
http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/team-articles.html

Content is King - Even In Direct Sales

2007-02-26T02:26:00.000-05:00

You've heard it said a hundred times before - content is king. But did you know this applies to those in direct sales too?

When your potential customer lands on your rep site, are they getting all the information they need to buy? Or are they just seeing short descriptions and price information? We've said it before and we'll say it again - all direct sales reps need their own website.

Direct sales companies are only concerned with selling one way - through reps. They aren't concerned about search engine optimization, content, link exchanges, or any other methods of selling online. They pay you because it's YOUR job to drive the traffic to the site and make the contacts.

The only way to sell online (other than starting your own direct sales company), is to offer content. Lots and lots of content. This is what it all comes down to.

Here's just a few things you can use more content for:

- Search Engine Optimization
Search engines crave content. The more words on the page, the higher the rankings for certain terms will be. If this is an area you are concerned with (and you should be!), you absolutely need content.

- Articles
Write your own articles and submit them - you'll be amazed at how much they increase your traffic.

- Product Reviews & Descriptions
Just imagine how many more sales you'll make if you give your buyers more information. Give them details on how you used the product, why you like it, how it worked for you, and what it could do for them. Or better yet, details on how other customers used the product, why they liked it and how it worked for them. They are more likely to buy if they are given more facts and opinions about the product.

Learning to write online is an important skill, but not a hard one to learn. It simply takes practice....which to get practice, you need to write!

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Is Adsense for you?

2007-02-02T08:45:00.000-05:00

It sounds so easy to get paid by simply running a few ads. But could
you be destroying your reputation and missing hundreds of sales just
for a few pennies?

If you own a website (which you should, even if your company
provides it!), AdSense can be a great source of revenue. You put up a few ads, and then you start seeing the clicks coming in. First a few pennies, then a few dimes ... before you know it, you are seeing several dollars a day. Awesome!

However, if you are trying to sell a product, you could be losing
out on HUNDREDS of dollars. What's worse, you could be destroying your reputation in the process.

When a potential customer hits your site, they have a specific idea
of what they want in mind. You only have a few seconds to sell them
your spectacular product. What happens when the first thing they see is an ad for a similar product?

Those advertising on Google are smart cookies. They know how to
write some killer headlines that really pull in results. Now think - even if your product is exactly what they want, if the other ad SOUNDS better, how fast do you think your visitor is going to go running off? You just got maybe 10 cents when you could have made several dollars. How many times a day could that be happening?

What's worse - what if someone in your company is advertising, and
you just handed the sale to another rep? Direct sales is competitive
enough, you don't need to be giving away sales!

Get out of the "side income" reasoning right now. It's absolutely
NOT worth the lost "main income".

If you are looking for another way to pull in a "side income",
consider affiliate programs. Not only will you get paid better, but you have full control over what you offer. It doesn't have to be competition, but rather something that compliments your main products.

Just remember - AdSense doesn't belong on websites selling products!

----------------------------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive
to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

5 Super Tips to Building a Successful Team

2007-01-25T15:18:00.000-05:00

While you always want to put your customers first, don't forget about your silent income - your team members!

A good team member usually won't take up too much of your time. Aside from a few question here and there, the hardest working downline members are busy working their business and training themselves.

However, it's important to remember this - even if they don't ask for your help, they may need it. Make sure you are paying attention to all of your team, not just the ones contacting you.

Here are a few things you can do to help keep motivation up, and let your downline know you are behind them 100%:

1. Team newsletters
Do you have information or tips to give? Organize them in a simple newsletter. This can be monthly, weekly, or random. Just be sure you have a list they join when they sign up under you. Follow all spam laws on this one!

2. Team incentives
Hold a montly contest for the most sales, or something similar. This helps boost your own income, while getting your team motivated at the same time. If your company holds a contest, sweeten the deal and offer something extra if someone from your team wins.

3. Give a personal touch
Don't forget about birthdays, holidays, and other special days. Keep good track of these important dates and include your downline members on your "card-giving" lists. The extra note will let them know they are important to you!

4. Team Blog
A great way to keep in contact with everyone. There is many different ways you could set this up to fit your needs. You can give all team members full access to make posts or you could have it set up so they can only leave comments, ask questions etc. You can keep your blog private so only yourself and your team members have access or you can keep this open to the public so everyone can read it.

5. Team Training
Part of your responsibilities as a direct selling leader is to train your team members on the specifics of building their direct selling business. One way you can do this is to hold face-to-face team meetings with local team members. Another way thanks to the wonderful world wide web, you can now hold meetings with team members from all over the world. No matter how you choose to do it, training is a necessary part of your role as a team leader.

There are many other ways to help motivate and train your team, Just remember, they are working for you as hard as they are working for themselves!

-------------------
Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive to help women in direct sales. Find out how you can earn some extra cash while training your team at
http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/affiliate.html

Three Ways to Automate Your Business Fast

2007-01-17T18:49:00.000-05:00

The use of autoresponders is a great way to automate your business fast, freeing up precious time you could be using to do other important aspects in your direct sales business. Set up properly, they’ll make your business more automated without losing that personal touch. The following are just a few ideas for you.

Business Opportunity Information
You could set up your autoresponder to send out information on your business opportunity. For example, you would take a list of frequently asked questions about your business and put them into your autoresponder. Put a form on your website for potential recruits to request more information and then it’s all done automatically for you. This also saves you from having to answer the same questions over and over again. Don’t forget to set up a follow up message to ask if they had any more questions or needed more information!

Catalog Requests
Set up an autoresponder for potential customers to request catalogs. An example on how to do this would be like this: Set up a form on your website for customers to enter their mailing and email address. Set up your autoresponder to send them a message letting them know that you’ve received their request and you’ll be sending out the catalog. Then have it set to send out another message in about a week – just to confirm that they’ve received your catalog and making sure they didn’t have any questions. Next you might want to set it to send out another message in 3 – 4 days maybe offering a special discount “just for them”. Then for your final message, you could let them know about a newsletter you offer with instructions on how to join.

New Recruit Training
Autoresponders are a great way to train your new team members! Here you could take a list of important information about the company, product etc., and put them into the autoresponder to be automatically delivered over time. Another idea is to set it up to send out business tips about online parties, home parties, or just running their business in general. With this, the possibilities are endless.

The above is just a touch of what you can do because, as mentioned, there are so many things you can do with an autoresponder. With a little bit of creativity, you’re sure to come up with something that will help your business stand above the rest and with a little research you’re sure to find a program that will work for you.

For a jumpstart on your research, feel free to take a look at the autoresponder we recommend at: http://www.mommyshelperonline.com/autoresponder.html

Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com

Top 5 Ways to Kick Start Your Online Business

2007-01-10T23:01:00.000-05:00

Top 5 Ways to Kick Start Your Online Business

It's a brand new year and time and the perfect time to give your business the kick start it so desperately needs. Did you ever get the feeling that your business is at a standstill even if you've been in business for a while? Of course it does. It happens to everyone - I know that because it's happened to me time and time again. In the following you'll find the top five ways to give your business a boost.

1. Build a Website
Yes, we're starting at the very beginning here. I've seen too many folks who for example are affiliate marketers or direct sales representatives and they're still working with their "company issued" website. Sure, that might be the ideal (and easy way out). However, it is time to break out of that shell and build something better.

2. Learn SEO
Build It and They Will Come - Bull! That just does NOT happen so get that out of your head now. Take the time now and learn a little about Search Engine Optimization. Why waste the time building a website if the search engines can't find you? There are a lot of things out there that you should be doing and more importantly, things you shouldn't be doing. Learn how to build your website the right way now and you'll thank yourself later.

3. Start a Newsletter
Hopefully you already have one but, if you don't - start one now! You NEED a way to keep in front of your customer / visitors on a regular basis. Build a list of folks who WANT to know when you have specials, know when you have a new product, etc. etc. Your newsletter doesn't have to be something huge and elaborate. As a matter of fact, here's when the K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Sweetie) concept comes into play.

4. Advertise Your Business
To gain exposure/brand recognition, gain immediate sales, announce new products/services and search engine optimization are just a few of the reasons why you need to advertise. Very few businesses can survive without some type of advertising. It's also one of the most important aspects in running certain types of businesses. Unfortunately, it seems to be one of the biggest steps missed and/or done incorrectly. Take the time to learn more about online advertising, sales copy writing and don't skip this important step!

5. Online Promotion
There are many, many other ways to promote your business online (in addition to traditional advertising). Ebook writing, mini courses and article writing are just a few tactics. Believe it or not, these CAN be used with ANY online business (even affiliate marketers and direct sales representatives). Make it your goal to write one of the above this year.

-----------
Anita DeFrank is the author of Kick Start Your Online Business. The online world is full of possibility. It gives you the power to meet people from all over the world that you could never dream of meeting and better yet, Do Business with these people. Stop wasting time sifting through all the advice that may or may not be useful and learn from her mistakes. Learn more about her book at http://www.mommyshelperonline.com/kickstart.html

3 Steps To Planning Your Own Event

2006-12-07T18:31:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

If you have a hard time locating events in your area which are
reasonably priced, it may be time for you to start planning your own
event.

Planning your own event isn't as hard as you may think. While it is
time consuming and requires a lot of organization skills, it could
bring you a whole lot of local business.

Step 1 - Finding Vendors

The first thing you need to do is make sure you know enough vendors
to host your event. If you know other local home business owners,
get in contact with them and see if they can give you names. We've
been contacted several times because our name was passed on by
someone else who we met at a craft show.

Step 2 - Plan Your Costs

You'll need to rent a local community center or other space for your
event. Many are low cost, while others may cost you several hundred.
Go by your list above to figure out how much space you may need.
Remember not all those you have contact information for may contact
you, so it's best to over book than under book.

Be sure you also keep the cost of advertising in mind. Call your
local radio stations and newspapers to find out how much it will be
to run ads. You may want to kindly ask your vendors to let their
customers know they'll be attending your show. Don't make it a
requirement, but do ask. Many will do so automatically just because
it's easier for their customers to meet them at an event.

Step 3 - Set Your Date

Check for events around the area in the larger cities as well as
smaller towns to make sure you aren't holding your event on the same
day as another. We've had to turn down many offers because we were
attending another show. Not only will you be missing many vendors,
but attendance will be lower as well. NEVER book your event on the
same day as another craft show or similar event. Booking around
other events in town which compliment your event is fine though.

Once the date is set, you can now start collecting money from your
vendors and booking spaces. Keep your cost as low as possible, but
do as much advertising as you can as well. Low cost options such as
signs in town work wonders and help you stretch your advertising
budget. Depending on the size of the town, you won't want to charge
more than $10-20 per space. The more you do your event though, the
more you will be able to charge since locals will begin to expect
the show every year.

While organizing shows can be a lot of work, it can be a wonderful
way for you to build a bigger customer base within your own town.

Have fun!

5 Tips for Holiday Craft Shows

2006-12-04T15:46:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

Attending craft show can be a profitable experience if you use the following tips:

1. Show off your best products
Have an eye catching product? Don't leave it at home! They may not sell, but they'll bring more to your table. Make sure what you are showing off is an item you sell, and not just a prop.

2. Keep your table simple
Flashy lights, decorations, and tons of shelves are not needed. Keep your focus on your products.

3. Talk to your customers
While walking around we noticed not a lot of vendors were talking with their customer and encouraging them to buy. You don't have to be pushy, but ask them what they are looking for. You might have what they want, but they may not see it right away!

4. Have nice brochures
This is something free they can take home to look at later, so you want to make sure it outlines your business and products well. If your company brochures are expensive, design simple ones at home to print and take to your show. Keep the company brochures to include with orders.

5. Smile!
More than just interacting with your customers, be friendly as well. A smile can go a long way!

Craft shows may take time to get use to and profit from, but once you do they can be your best friend. As the old saying goes, "practice makes perfect", but with these tips you will have a good jump start!

Direct Sales Expert or Fake?

2006-09-14T15:42:00.000-05:00

Direct sales help sites for moms are a dime a dozen. You don't get far in the work at home mom community without running into a business help site. Although how do you know they really are really qualified to help?

Before you take advice as fact, here are some points you should watch for.

1. Are they in direct sales?
A silly question to ask, but you'd be surprised. All site owners have one purpose - to make money. Of course there is not necessarily anything wrong with this because, we’re all in business to make money. However, many who run "help" sites have absolutely no experience in the industry.

2. Is there outside experts?
While it's great for experts to share their own tips, they should also be seeking advice from others in the industry. What works for some may not work for all. Remember, even the greatest of mentors need a mentor.

3. Is the information solid?
Always check out a newsletter before buying any products from the site. If the newsletter is fluff or filled with recycled information, beware. Double check articles - you never know when a ghostwriter with even less experience on the subject has done poor research while writing the article.

4. Is the information being shared ethical?
If you don’t believe in what you’re being told to do, you can’t possibly make it work for yourself. In other words, do they share the same goals as you?

There's a lot of good information all over the internet. Unfortunately, there's no real solid way of knowing if what you are getting is true or not. The best thing to do is if you are in doubt, ask others that you know are successful for advice of what they utilize.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com for free weekly tips.

How to Take Orders at Craft Shows

2006-08-10T07:33:00.000-05:00

We've discussed how important it is to have stock on hand, and how you want to sell off the table rather than take orders. However, if you are just getting started and your stock is low, there's several ways you can increase the number of orders you take in at an offline show.

1. Display Order Forms
If you have products which must be custom ordered, display those next to your order forms. It's an extra visual for the customer and understanding of how your ordering process works. They also know they can quickly put in their order if the forms are already on the table. Remember your customers don't have a lot of time!

2. Display All Products
While you may not have a large stock, you'll want to put out as many products as possible. Let the customers see and touch all products. Use those products if possible - such as placing food in a dish which holds food. I once saw a Pampered Chef rep use cookie cutters on meat and cheese samples which were placed on a serving dish. They displayed what could be done with the cookie cutters, as well as the use for the dish.

3. Don't Hide Catalogs
Catalogs can be expensive, but don't hide them. If you don't want just anyone walking away with them, place pages in a binder which can be set out on the table. Shoppers at craft shows want to see prices. Don't hide it from them or they may loose interest! You shouldn't be ashamed of your prices if the product is of high quality.

4. Talk to Customers
This is important no matter how your are selling. Get to know your customers and their needs. Don't assume your display will sell your products alone. Even the worst display will sell hundreds of products if the person behind it is talking. With so much to look at, it's easy for your customer to miss an item they may be truly interested in. Also it's possible you don't have a certain item on your table they would like, and they may not take the time to flip through your catalog.

These are the basic ways to make sure you sell the most products if you are taking orders. Mostly it takes a lot of trial and error, so don't give up after only a few shows.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Is Inventory Important?

2006-08-04T08:49:00.000-05:00

One of the hot questions when it comes to direct sales and offline shows is this:

"Do I need a large inventory, or can I just take orders?"

Honestly, this is no easy answer and it's going to mostly depend on what products you are selling. Some items (such as custom products) are near impossible to have on stock and must be ordered. Other items (such as candles), the shopper wants to have in hand before they leave. Candles are one of those items which are NOT unique (no matter if you have a great product), and a shopper knows they can easily pick it up at just about any store.

For the most part, you are going to want a large display of products to sell right off the table. When shoppers are roaming around craft shows, they are looking to shop. If they wanted to have items shipped to them, they would probably be shopping online. I'm sure they do, but only because they have no other option when shopping online or at a home party. People LOVE to walk out with something in hand.

I know one of the benefits of a direct sales company is not to have large amounts of stock on hand. However, if you plan to have tables at offline events, stock is a must. Even when taking orders, you must have some type of display. This way the customer can see and touch, knowing exactly what they will be getting should they order.

Be warned though, even with large amounts of stock on the table, it's like pulling teeth to get orders. For example, occasionally we'll have a 12oz Jelly Jar in a scent they really like but no 8oz Jelly Jar. We'll suggest they put in an order and have it delivered (no shipping for local orders since we deliver). Almost always they'll go with a different candle or none at all.

In over a year, we've taken in a total of 3 orders. The reason for each order was as follows:

Order #1: Previous customer who had purchased a candle at another show. She smelled a candle she liked and bought it, but wanted 2 more in a larger size. So she not only already knew the candles, but wanted more than what we had on the table.

Order #2: A customer wanted 4 of the same candle while we only had 2 in stock. Because it was a gift for a special occasion, she decided to order.

Order #3: Another previous customer. This one had smelled each scent on the table and wanted different colored votives all in the same scent. Again, she knew what the product was like and wanted more than what was on the table.

In conclusion, while you can get away with taking orders only, it's better to sell outright. Shoppers are ready to impulse buy, and you don't want to miss out on it!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Are You Ready for a Vacation?

2006-07-13T09:44:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

While this may seem like the perfect title for an ad, this is really an
important business topic! There's much to do before going on vacation,
and your business needs to be ready.

We all need a break sometimes. Running a business is hard work, no
doubt about that. If you are planning your family vacation, don't forget to
make sure your business and customers are taken care of while you are
gone!

- Notify friends and communities
Be sure to let all your groups and communities know you will be gone
for a set amount of time. Email your closest associates to let them know
when you are leaving and when you will be back. You never know if
someone will be looking for you, so you'll want to have a few that can say
"she'll be back on this date". If you help moderate any message boards,
communities etc, make sure you let the board owner know you will be
gone.

- Put groups on "No Mail"
Make sure all your groups are set to no mail or daily digest, so you
aren't overwhelmed when you return.

- Notify team members
Be absolutely sure you let your team members know you'll be gone until
a certain date. Give them back up emails and phone numbers to call in
case they need immediate help. You may consider asking your upline or a
trustworthy (knowledgeable and active) downline member to help with
some basic questions for you.

- Notify customers
If you have a personal website, edit your home page to mention you are
on vacation. You can still take orders while you are gone, but if you
ship them out yourself, make sure they know the order won't be filled
until you return.

- Have back ups
If there is someone who can take over some of your duties while you are
gone, contact them before you leave. Make sure they have access to
certain email addresses and websites.

- Do NOT put your email on auto reply!
Many do this and it's not a bad idea, although it's extremely annoying
for those who already know or don't care. Auto replies go to everyone
who sends you an email, including newsletter owners, groups, etc. You
could be doing more harm than good with auto replies!

These are some of the basics of taking care of business while you are
on vacation. The most important thing to remember is not to worry -
remember, you are on vacation to RELAX!

Have fun!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com for free weekly tips.

The Customer Is Always Right

2006-06-24T08:31:00.000-05:00

One of the most basic rules of business, but often times forgotten. No matter what goes on we must remember - the customer is always right!

This tried and true statement stretches back to the beginning of the small business revolution. When customer service was the most important aspect of business, which set them apart from the big corporations.

Offering the best customer service possible is just as important today as it was more than 100 years ago. In today's world there are just too many options. If you don't treat your customers right, they will have no problem doing business with someone else.

Not only does poor customer service lose a customer, but negativity travels far. Most know a happy customer might tell a few people (if any) about your business, but an unhappy person will tell everyone they know. As a small business owner, can you afford to lose hundreds of customers due to one unhappy customer?

In the work at home mom community, when business is done with other business owners, it can get tricky. We are suppose to understand the hardships of running a small business, as well as show compassion to family emergencies. However, business is business and customers are customers. No matter what the social status of your customer, they are still just that - a customer.

The lesson here is to always treat everyone like a customer. No matter how mad you are about what they've said, keep your cool and make it right. Don't argue with them, because they WILL spread the word on how hard you are to work with. If you lose money because of the situation, live and learn. There are situations where the customer will be in the wrong and just trying to scam you, but don't ever assume they are. Learn from the mistake and put your own rules in place so it won't happen again.

It's inevitable, if you're in business, at some point, you're going to have to deal with a disgruntled customer. The protocol should be to apologize and get the issue resolved as quickly and painless for the customer as possible (within reason of course).

The bottom line which I feel needs to be said just one more time - the customer is always right! Remember it, and you will go far in business!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Find Your Niche in Direct Sales

2006-06-08T14:04:00.000-05:00

by Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

Direct sales is hard, especially with all the competition. The best way to stand out from the crowd is to have your own website.

We've said this time and time again in many different articles, but it can't be stressed enough. If you are serious about doing business online, you MUST have your own, unique website.

Many direct sales companies do not allow personal websites, or for you to place product info on a site. If this is the case with your business, there IS a way around it. More on this further in the article.

The first step in finding your niche is to take a good hard look at your business (or all your businesses if you have more than one). Ask yourself the following questions:

What are the best selling products?
Which are your favorites?
Who is your target customer?
Which do you know the most about?
How much could you say about specific lines?

The next step is figuring out which products to focus on based on the answers from the above questions. On our message boards, we posted this example on finding a niche for Mary Kay:

When I think Mary Kay, I think make-up. Period. When I visit the main site, I see more specific things like skin care, spa & bath, fragrances, and other things that I didn't know about. Many items could easily be made a niche from.

From the example above, I see Mary Kay offers skin care products. Diving deeper into that I see "anti-aging skin care". Perfect niche! Instead of selling "Mary Kay products" or having a general site, what about a site focused on just the anti-aging products? There's an entire line so it shouldn't be hard.

While Mary Kay does not permit the use of their trademark on a website, here's what you CAN do. Create a content website based on anti-aging tips, using products, proper diet, and exercise. Borderline health site, but with a focus on the anti-aging. Lead into your Mary Kay site with "For more information on products, visit...".

This is just an example, and the same idea can be applied to ANY business. Other examples include websites dedicated to specific layout ideas for those selling scrapbooking supplies, specific scented items for those selling bath and body, specific information sites for health product (focusing on one issue the health product you sell takes care of, such as diabetes or other health issues).

The possibilities are absolutely endless. There is a lot of room for reps of the same business to all have completely different websites. To gather suggestions, I suggest using a keyword tool which will show you exactly what people are searching for. There is an excellent one here: http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/

Choose a topic that is small, yet has enough searches and can be expanded on.

Good luck in finding your niche!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/ for free weekly tips.

7 Summer Survival Tips

2006-06-01T08:00:00.000-05:00

Will Your Business Survive Summer Break?

Summer is approaching and soon the children will be out of school. Is your schedule ready?

Some of you may know from past years, when the kids are out for the summer your "quiet time" during school hours is no more. Here are some tips to keep the school age children busy while you keep up with your business:

1. Plan family days
Take a day each week to spend the entire day with your kids. Make it a weekly event. Do things such as go out for ice cream, going to the zoo, etc. Try to plan it for in the middle of the week.

2. Set aside nights and weekends
In addition to your weekly outings with the kids, make sure you set aside your evenings and weekends to focus on them.

3. Hire Local Neighborhood Kids
Is there a responsible child in your neighborhood? Hire them to take your children to the pool, the park, or other areas in the neighborhood. Preteens are always looking for a way to make some extra money, or someone to pay for their day at the pool.

4. Have crafts and movies lined up
Avoid the "I'm bored" comments by having several activities set aside for children to do for at least 2 hours, giving you enough time to finish a project or two.

5. Take breaks outside
Since the weather is nice, children will be begging to go out. Make sure you take a break daily to go out for even just an hour. Remind them when it's time to go back inside they will be able to go out again when you are finished working.

6. Trade Babysitting
Talk to other mothers in your community and trade babysitting. Remember the first tip? Take someone else's kids on your family day out, and ask if they will watch your children on another day.

7. Hire Babysitters
When all else fails and you need to get major work done, send them to daycare once a week. Don't feel guilty - it's only one day! Your kids need a break from you too sometimes, and the chance to play with other children.

Good luck surviving the summer, and don't forget to enjoy it yourself!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/ for free weekly tips.

5 Tips for More Leads & Reorders

2006-05-25T14:38:00.000-05:00

by Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

Recently I wanted to contact a representative whose business card I had. The business card had an email address however, when I emailed her, it bounced. I checked the business card for a website address which had none. I had to find the company's corporate site and hunt her down through her name. I had no personal website link and no representative number. A word of caution, an average customer won't go through all the trouble.

Here's 5 tips to make sure you are making it as easy as possible for customers to contact you:

1. Contact Information on Promotional Materials
Make sure your contact information is on all materials you hand out (ie: brochures, catalogs, business cards). Your materials should have at least your name, company name, consultant number, email address and website url.

2. Business Cards
Have at least business cards on you at all times. If you have smaller brochures, pamphlets or something of that nature you can pop in your purse, bring those too.

3. Signature Lines
Utilize signature lines. I don't know how many emails we've gotten from folks who don't use signatures. It's a super-easy method that can used with little to no effort. Check out your email program to find out how to set one up.

All you really need is a catchy little tag-line and add your website url. I've also seen signatures that look like a business card. It includes their name, business name, consultant number, email address and url. I do not however, recommend the business card graphics in your email. Don't forget that there are some who don't allow html in their email and they take up way too much space. They're almost as bad as using fancy stationery on your email. Almost all message boards allow you to have a signature line also. Use them!

4. Reordering Information
Include a business card, pamphlet, catalog or something of this nature in every order you send out. You already have the customer, now make it easy for them to reorder.

5. Return Labels
The next time you buy return address labels, include your website address. For example:
MyWebsite.com123
Any Street
Any Town, Any State 12345
Use these labels whether you're sending out your next order or paying your electric bill.

The above are only a few ideas that can be done with little to no effort and inexpensively. Use your creativity, it can be your best friend. Think about the things that you're already doing and alter them just a bit to your businesses benefit.

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/ for free weekly tips.

You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

2006-05-18T13:30:00.000-05:00

You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

Once you’ve been in direct sales for a few years it’s easy to get in the “I know what I’m doing mindset.” You stop reading articles, training manuals and books. “I’ve been doing this for ten years, what can I possibly learn that I don’t already know?” Simply put … a lot. Are you still using the same booking methods you used five years ago? Everyone in your community knows you’re the person to see for your particular product line, right? Or do they?

It never hurts to try something new for a change. Liven up your presentation or display. Play a new game or try a new technique. Don’t get yourself in a rut doing the same things over and over again.

We’ve all had it happen … A group of friends get together and book parties to help each other out. The next thing you know; you have four or five parties and the guest list is almost exactly the same. Just because the guests are the same, doesn’t mean the party has to be the same too. Change the format for each party. Play different games or change the presentation. Keep it interesting and keep them guessing.

Pull out that old training material or better yet, go online and search for a new book. But while you’re reading this material, remember that your mind needs to be like that book. You’re not going to get anything out of it unless you open it. Ever do that? “Wow! What a great idea!” And that’s as far as it goes? Are you actually applying these things?

I don’t know how many times we’ve gotten feedback thanking us for the great tip we shared. We of course reply with the usual – glad to help type response. The next time we’ll say, “Great! Now let us know when you’ve applied it.”

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly.

Are You A Good Team Leader?

2006-05-11T07:12:00.000-05:00

When and how was the last time you contacted your downline? Keeping in touch with your downline and proper training is a very important aspect of being a team leader. I don’t know many people who were born “just knowing what to do”, how about you?

Setting up a Yahoo Group is a great way to train your team members that comes with many benefits such as:

- Members will be able to check old posts to see if some questions have been asked and answered.

- Eventually, you’ll find that other team members will start to help answering questions (saving yourself a lot of time).

- Files such as printable brochures, price lists, frequently asked questions etc. can be uploaded your group.

- You can create databases with important information.- Calendars can be created with important dates to remember.

- You have access to a reminder program that you can set up to send out a reminder on a certain time, date etc.

- You can send out articles, tips and tricks to help your team build their businesses. You can sign up to have weekly direct sales articles sent to you via email at http://direct-sales-team.blogspot.com

There are many, many other benefits of doing this. Setting up a yahoo group is very easy to do and best of all … It’s free. You can set up your own yahoo group by going to http://groups.yahoo.com

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Is Your Downline Needy?

2006-05-04T08:28:00.000-05:00

Of course as a team leader, it’s your responsibility to be there and help your downline as much as possible. However, having overly needy team members can be detrimental to your business.
Taking each of your downline members by the hand for every single step makes it very difficult to do other things such as …

- Take care of other members who might need quite as much help.
- Build your team by recruiting.
- Promote your own business.
- And worst of all, you run out of time to take proper care of your customers.

You know who I’m talking about…

- The ones who ask the same questions over and over again.
- Those who ask the very same questions that are listed in the training manual you just gave them.
- Those who ask questions that can be answered by simply using a little basic, common sense.

Everyone (hopefully) wants to be a good team leader and wants to help their downline be as successful as possible … so, what do you do?

- Start keeping track of these questions. Start yourself a “FAQ” list with the answers and give them to every new team member.

- Start answering questions that you know are listed in training manuals or other materials like this:

“You will be paid commissions via paypal on the 10th of each month. This and other details are listed on page 22 in the Getting Started Manual.”

By doing this you’ll not only answer the question, but also hopefully this will remind them to check other materials before asking you. If you were to ask where they looked; more times than not you’re going to hear “Nowhere, I just contacted you.”

- Sometimes you’ll find that recruits are so deep into trying to do everything “perfect” that they forget that some things are just common sense. Have you ever heard of “Book Smart – Common Sense Dumb”? Politely remind your recruits to not make things so difficult and answer questions like this …
“Think about it this way … your customers can have their orders dropshipped to the recipient, so yes, you can have your orders dropshipped directly to your customers.

Don’t ever discourage your team members from asking questions. But do help them learn how to answer some questions on their own. This will not only help you have more time for more intense training and motivation but also will make your team members a lot more independent – eventually turning them into a much stronger business owner.

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Vendors Are Customers Too

2006-05-04T07:42:00.000-05:00

One of my problems with being a vendor at craft shows is making too many purchases. Since there are always two of us at the table, we often walk around and talk to other vendors. Which of course, leads to buying stuff. Many vendors do this, often times before the show or when they can "sneak away" for a few minutes.

A few weeks ago at a large craft show I was making my normal rounds before the show actually started. I came across a very large, nicely set up display of homemade gourmet mixes. You know the kind - dip mixes, teas, breads, etc. The table was set up for the most part, with samples already set out. There were cute signs and information carefully layed out on the table for customers to read, and at least 2 vendors working this table. The name itself caught my eye, since it's one I had thought I'd seen online, so I wanted to ask them a few questions.

I stood there for a few seconds, waiting for one of the vendors to finish her conversation with a personal friend. After a minute or so, they began to talk about a mutual friend of their's and his medical conditions, which happen to be something most wouldn't want to hear when looking at food. I couldn't get away from their table fast enough, I was disgusted! Not only did the vendor not acknowledge me in any way, but proceeded to talk to a friend about matters you do NOT want to hear when around food. Several hours later, I purchased a beer bread mix from their competition just a few tables down.

Some might say, "What's the big deal? The show hadn't started yet and you were a vendor!". While it's true the doors hadn't been officially opened yet, there were still other people around. Don't forget that vendors are customers too. There hasn't been one single show that I've been to where I didn't buy something from another vendors, or a vendor didn't buy from us. We treat EVERYONE like a customer, and because of that sell to several of the other vendors every time.

Basically what can be learned from this is don't ever write off a person as not being a customer. It doesn't matter how nice of a set up you have, if you aren't giving your full attention to every single person that walks by regardless of who they are, you are going to loose out!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help at offline events, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.htm

Directory Listings & Direct Sales

2006-04-27T21:21:00.000-05:00

Directory listings and other forms of advertising can be great exposure for anyone in business. However, if you are in direct sales and using a rep site you could be leaving lots of money on the table.

Even in direct sales, advertising online can be a huge benefit. One of the largest mistakes we see though, is the use of rep sites alone. Believe it or not, when advertising online your main objective is not to get customers to buy immediately. A very small percent will bookmark your site, so if your focus is just getting visitors that's all you'll have. And if you are lucky to get bookmarked … when is the last time you looked in your favorites list?

Instead of focusing on just getting people to your site to buy, focus on getting them to sign up to your list. This way you haven't lost them, they are just waiting to buy at a later time. To do this, of course, you will need your own website.

A rep site does have its purpose, and that's to complete the online buying process. It should be used as the end, not the start. Leads should come from your personal website or from you personally (offline or by email, stating to go to your rep site to order). Warm leads only should be sent to your rep site, while those just surfing should be sent to your personal website.

Contrary to popular belief, websites can be built fairly easily and inexpensively. So, do yourself and your pocketbook a favor and at least think about building your own personal website.

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Setting Up Tables for Success at Craft Shows

2006-04-27T13:20:00.000-05:00

One of the major questions after buying a vendor spot at a craft show is this: "How do I set up my table?". While it's important you have a nice looking table, the actual set up makes little or no difference. You don't have to be a professional designer to have a nice looking table.

When I walk around at craft shows I see many who use shelves, boxes, and other items to "lift" their items up. I also see banners, signs, and other "props" to make their items stand out. While these stands look extremely nice, it's not all the "extras" that pull in the sales.

Instead of focusing on how "pretty" your table looks (as important as that is), focus on how many items your visitors can pick up and hold. If you have candles, encourage them to pick up and smell everything. If you sell food, make absolutely sure you have samples. Scrapbooking supplies? Paper to touch, stamps to use, and other items to feel. Toys? Have lots to play with. It's been our experience the products the customer can actually pick up are the ones that sell the most.

Now don't get me wrong - you need a certain level of organization to your table. This doesn't have to be difficult though. Place like items together in groups, and the most eye catching items at the ends of the table (this catches the attention of people scanning, and if the eye catching item is at the end, they will stop for another look before moving on). Some candle reps I see lumping same scents together, while we prefer to lump types of candles together (all 8oz in ones area, 12oz behind them, 9oz teddy bears in front, melts all in one basket). This has always worked extremely well for us, and gives us a chance to spread out the scents over the entire table.

While tips are good, don't forget the best way to find what works for you is to just do it. Attend a craft show or two to see what others are doing, and talk to other vendors if you need more ideas. Good luck!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help at offline events, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.html

Craft Show Tables - Is Expensive Better?

2006-04-20T05:24:00.000-05:00

"More expensive doesn't always mean better. "

I think we all know this statement because it applies to just about any business expense, but over the weekend it was confirmed for us.

We attended a very established craft show featuring around 100 different vendors. This location has 4 craft shows a year, every year, and has been going on for over a decade. However, this was the first year we had attended this particular event as a vendor.

The layout was pretty simple, and they had two main sections. The front area by the door which lead into the main room (it's actually a theater at an amusement park, the main room was where the chairs would have been and crafters were even up on the stage). The other main area was the hallway that wrapped around the main section. It was easily accessible from all areas, and not hard to see. Even still, this narrow hallway section was about half the cost of the main. Since it was our first time at this event, we opted for the hallway because of the price and to see how it went.

I was amazed at how well we did considering we were "stuck out in the hallway". I really don't think there was many guests that didn't make it back in that hallway, and the table was large enough for us to make $200 in sales (the table cost $35). That was slightly above average for us to make that much for a table so cheap. The last event we attended was only about $150 in sales for the same size table. What really blew us away was talking with another vendor who stated this was the "slow show". *GASP!* If this was slow, I want to see the busy one for sure. *grin*

The main difference between costs was not so much the location, but the size of the space. Could we have made more with a fancy, large display instead of a table? Possibly, it's hard to say because of all the variables involved. We wouldn't know for sure unless we attended the same event at the same time of year. However, it's been our experience that the size of the area and massive set up makes little difference. Our table doesn't get much more basic, and our sales really come from talking with the customers. Just last fall at a different show someone with an elaborate display a few tables from us didn't even sell half as much as we did. We talked to our customers - he didn't as much. By the way, he had soy candles like us. ;)

The lesson from this experience was this: spending more on a table at a craft show doesn't always mean more sales. We took the smaller area in the out of the way place for less cost, and still made a nice profit. The guests were there to see all the tables, not just those in the main section, so we were found either way by most. Being in the main section could have gotten us lost in the crowd, because it even took us a few times walking around to find every table.

While taking a look at some of these shows before buying a table is a good idea, it's not always an option. Testing on your own is going to give you the best understanding of what's worth it and what's not. Don't be afraid to take a loss, and chalk it up to experience!

Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help at offline events, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.html

6 Quick Tips for a Successful Online Fair

2006-04-19T20:57:00.000-05:00

Online parties and fairs can be profitable for everyone involved, but not if they aren't done right. We've heard many complaints over poorly organized or planned events, even though anyone can hold a successful event. In this article, we'll cover the 6 basic tips to ensure that you as the coordinator have set up an event that will be worth the time of the vendors.

1. Set Up
One of the best ways to set up your vendor fair is to have all the vendors and contact information listed on one web page. Don't forget to include a link to "enter" the event.

2. Costs, Fees, Etc.
Whether or not to charge vendors is a highly debated topic and completely up to you. Should you decide to charge - be sure it is reasonable (especially for your first one).

3. Inviting Guests
Be sure to invite guests outside the "vendor list".

4. Vendor Advertising
Encourage your vendors to promote the event also. The more promotion that is done; the more guests you're likely to have.

5. Set a Schedule
Set a certain time for each vendor to do their presentations so that each vendor has their fair "time to share".

6. Choosing a Room
Choosing a room is a crucial decision for your event. Be sure to do your research on various rooms and be sure to ask for recommendations from others.

There are several other tips included in organizing an event, but the most important is to be organized and make sure there is enough promotion. The last thing you want is unhappy vendors walking away without so much as a lead because of poor planning!

------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Networking at Craft Shows

2006-04-13T08:42:00.000-05:00

When you attend a craft show as a vendor, the main goal is of course to make sales and gather leads. However, there's one important step that should be forgotten, and that's networking with the other vendors.

The last craft show I attended wasn't a large one, but it was very local. We had the choice to attend a large one in a big city, or a small local one. I sure am glad we picked the smaller one, because it gave us a chance to get more local leads and make a better impression.

Because there was two of us, we took turns walking around and talking with the other vendors. Not only did we gather display ideas, but we got to talk to the vendors about their businesses as well. As a result of doing this, several business cards were handed out, a wholesale lead gained, and another show was scheduled. I was most impressed with the additional show scheduled. If I wouldn't have gone to talk to her, I would have never known she held her own shows in a small town near by.

Networking online is so important, yet many overlook how much more important it is to network offline. By making connections and friendships with other vendors, you are opening the door for more opportunities to promote your products. The more you network, the more lucky it seems you are.

The lesson of this story is to not stay stuck in your own table, but rather get out on the floor and chat with other people. You will be surprised on what you can find out, and how much better you will do!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Capturing Leads

2006-04-13T08:39:00.000-05:00

Attending craft shows can be an excellent way to pick up sales, but more importantly - gathering leads. Your ultimate goal is of course to make sales in the end, but to have the name and address of your customer can prove to be more valuable than just one simple sale.

There's many ways to capture a lead or get the name of your customer at the very least. Two of the main ideas I spotted at the last craft show that were working the best were:

1. Drawings
This is almost a given, and we all know this is one of the best ways to pull in leads. Most tables has the options to check off boxes for more information on the products, earning free products, or more info on earning money.

2. "For Display Only" Products
Several tables I saw that were set up very nicely were for display only. There were no "cash and carry" products at all, only displays of popular products. Reps would talk to each person that walked by and encourage orders from the catalog. This way they were still making sales, but they also had information on the customer so they could contact them later.

At your next craft show, see if you can use one or both of these ideas to gather leads. Don't forget that your mailing list is gold, and will bring you the more sales than any other type of marketing!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Holding Successful Drawings & Contests

2006-04-12T20:09:00.000-05:00

Contests and drawings can be a great way to pull in business. However, if not done correctly you can end up with nothing but a whole lot of freebie seekers. The rule of quality over quantity applies here!

Just a few weeks ago I held a drawing for a $25 gift certificate. I learned quite a bit from this drawing, and will be able to fine tune this type of promotion in the future. One of the main points I learned was the key to a successful drawing is when you get the absolute most exposure and leads as a result. There are several main points you'll want to focus on with your drawing.

With your drawing, you should:

- Gather information from potential customers
In the last drawing I did, I asked those entering a few simple questions aside from basic information of name and address that had to do with the site. They actually had to look around before filling in an answer. Forms that weren't complete were tossed, since the rules were clearly posted and said "please fill out form completely". I was able to weed out those that were trying to grab a freebie from those that were truly interested enough to follow rules.

I also was able to gather some interesting information about my customers, like how much they spend a month on my type of product, and how often they use it. Valuable information since it comes straight from the customer!

- Schedule catalog shows and online parties
With any drawing online or offline, you'll want to ask those entering about being a hostess. It's a way of using the freebie seekers to your advantage. You know they won't buy, but they can find people that will and still get their free products.

- Sign up newsletter subscribers
If you want a responsive list, don't force them to sign up to enter your drawing. Making them do nothing but enter an email address to enter isn't going to do you any good, and they'll probably use a "throw away" email address to send your newsletter to. Instead, plug your newsletter AFTER they enter your drawing. Give them a chance to look around your site first with the questionnaire, and THEN offer the newsletter. You'll build a much more responsive list this way.

- Build a relationship with winner
At the end of the drawing and after you pick your winner, you can now build a relationship with them for future orders. Follow up, ask questions, talk to them, etc. Treat them as you would any other customer!

One of my main regrets for the last drawing I held was that I didn't ask enough questions. Had I done a longer questionnaire, I could have gotten more information and kept the potential customer on my site longer. It's in my notes, that's for sure. ;)

The main point here is, don't make it easy. Easy to figure out, but not easy to enter. Don't be afraid to make them jump through a few hoops. You may not end up with as many entering, but you'll have a much more targeted group of entries. The more work they do to enter, the more interested they are!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/ for free weekly tips.

Online Parties Increase Sales

2006-04-06T08:56:00.000-05:00

Everyone in the direct sales party plan business knows what a home party is. It's the basics of a direct sales company, more or less. Even if your company doesn't focus on home parties, you know what they are and almost everyone has been to one.

However, with the growing number of people coming online to do business, online parties are becoming more and more popular. Even still, not many know what an online party is or how they can drastically make a difference in your online sales.

The basics behind an online party are very much like that of a home party. Guests are invited to one location to listen to a presentation, and then look over products to buy. Often times games are played to keep the guests having fun, and products ordered.

With online parties, guests only have to log in to a chat room where they meet the consultant, and often times a hostess. Instead of looking at products in a catalog or on a table, products are viewed on websites. Games are still played, but done virtually.

Online parties can work wonderfully for consultants, hostesses, and guests. No one has to drive to a home, the hostess doesn't have to clean house, no one needs baby sitters, family and friends from all over the country can join the party, yet all the same benefits apply to everyone involved.

Despite the ease of online parties, it's equally hard to gather all guests into a chat room at one time. Some are still "new" at "the computer thing", so may not be able to easily enter the chat room. Time conflicts still apply, even though not having to drive makes it easier. Remembering to be online at a certain time is also a set back, since there is no pressure to go somewhere, it’s easier to forget. Because of this, you'll want to keep your party open for a certain amount of time after to make sure you don't miss party sales and make sure you are doing all the advertising possible.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. For additional help getting started on setting up your first online party, visit: http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/online-party-class.html

Importance of Calculating Costs

2006-03-29T23:07:00.000-05:00

First let me say there's nothing wrong with exploring every possible marketing venue. There are lots of ways - both good and bad - to pull in sales. However, while something you have considered may seem like a good way to pull in sales, a closer look at your costs to run the campaign may prove differently.

Let's say for an example you decide to give out freebies at random. Giving samples can be a good way to bring in sales, but at the same time can make you completely broke. Just for this example, let's say you've sent out 100 samples and from this you pulled in 5 sales. Sounds like the campaign worked, right?

Many would stop here and say "I'm going to send out more samples, because this is bringing me sales". Before you start in on your victory dance, I can't stress enough the importance of comparing your costs to your profits. When doing something like this, you absolutely cannot rely on reorders or repeat customers. Keep in mind it takes nearly as much time and money to KEEP a customer than it does to get them in the first place. The mind set of "I’m getting my name out there" has GOT to go. With a small business, you are working on building relationships and repeat customers, not branding like the big businesses do.

Breaking down our example, let's say our freebies cost $1 each. There's more math involved in figuring your costs, but for this example we'll just set that cost for each sample. Now since you sent out 100 samples, your cost was a $100. Quite a bit of money for just one campaign! Sent out over a period of time (say several months) you might not even notice that it cost this much. Another reason why it's important to watch these things, because you can see how easy it can be to go broke quickly.

From our example we decided that 5 sales were made. Let's say our average commission is $9 per sale, so with 5 sales that makes $45. Great! You made sales! But wait - take a look at those costs again. Remember how it cost you $100 to send it out? You just lost $55 as well as precious time.

The purpose of this example isn't to scare you off of marketing all together, but rather to figure out your average costs BEFORE you start handing out samples or any other type of marketing. Regardless of how much figuring you do, there's still a chance for a loss instead of a profit, but that's fine. It happens, and it's normal. Testing, tweaking, and tracking are how we learn. After comparing your first try, decide how it can be better and try again. Either that, or try something else that will bring you a profit.

If I didn't mention it enough before, it's EXTREMELY important you track your costs closely. Our examples above proved this. Regardless of what you are told, it's not about getting the sales, it's about making a profit. That's the key word here - PROFIT. Just like a major company, it's all about the bottom line.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. If you need additional help calculating costs, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/calculating-costs.html

Know Your Business

2006-03-22T23:22:00.000-05:00

Usually we speak about these matters to those who are new to direct sales or are looking to possibly get in to direct sales, however, having spoken with quite a few different reps recently; we’ve found that even those who have been involved with direct sales for many years still don’t know the definitions of different terms used. This of course could be for a myriad of reasons such as maybe one particular term doesn’t affect your company, you never asked and your sponsor never mentioned, or you just never knew. Even if a particular term does not affect your company, you could very well be asked by a prospect and you’ll want to know so you can answer this question quickly and easily without a hitch. An even worse case scenario would be that you weren’t aware of a particular rule/regulation and you’ve been going against your company's regulations all along. Not following a company’s regulations could easily be call for dismissal from your company. Remember, not knowing is not an excuse. The following is a list of frequently asked questions/terms and definitions to help you. If you find a question that you can’t answer … find out!

Distributor Kit – Also commonly referred to as a start up kit, rep kit, etc. these are usually a compilation of products, business supplies, brochures etc. These are sometimes offered for new consultants only but are also offered to any consultant. These are usually discounted through a bulk package rather than buying each item individually.

Tax Requirements – Make sure you know what your company’s tax requirements are. It’s also a good idea to do some research online about other states' requirements also. If you do a lot of recruiting online, you’re very likely to have a downline of members all over the country. No one expects you to become a tax pro but, it never hurts to be able to share links with your potential recruits about their particular state so they can do the research themselves. This question is ranked high in the top questions asked.

Sales Quota – Some companies require their representatives to sell/buy a certain amount of merchandise in a certain amount of time. These usually range from monthly, quarterly or yearly. If a consultant does not meet the required quota, some companies will remove that consultant.

Customer Service - Be sure you know exactly how various order problems are handled. Who does the consultant contact and how in this unfortunate event?

Drop Ship – Dropshipping is when a consultant places an order with their company and the company automatically ships the product directly to the customer.

Commission Structure – This is another high-ranked question. Of course everyone wants to know what they’re going to make. Make sure that you clearly understand the commission structure so you can explain it to your potential recruit.

Territory Restrictions – Some companies have territory restrictions, meaning that you may only be able to sell in a certain area. Often this is set up according to towns, counties and sometimes even states.

Hostess Credits/Gifts – These are items or prizes that hostesses can earn/win for holding their parties. What are these prizes/gifts and who is responsible for paying for them?

Inactive Fees – These are fees that might be incurred if a consultant were to go inactive and decided to re-join.

Bonuses – Some companies like to offer added incentives/bonuses to their consultants for maybe when they reach a certain number in sales or reach a certain level with their downline.

Downline – These are the people that you “sponsor” or those who join the company “under you”. These are also known as team members.

Fundraising Opportunities – Many direct sales companies have a separate plan set up especially for organizations, teams etc. so they can earn money for their organization.

Buy Back Policy – Often companies will buy back any unused merchandise that consultants have not been able to sell. As required by the Direct Selling Association, most companies will buy back the unused merchandise at up to 90% of the cost.

Non-Compete Clause – Many direct sales companies have a non-compete clause in place meaning that consultants may not sell for a competing company while representing their own. There are even some that will not allow reps to sell for any other company – competing or not.

Return Policy – Make sure you’re well aware of your company’s return policy.

Advertising Regulations – Some companies will not allow their representatives to advertise online. Some will not allow consultants to mention the company's name or even certain brand names in any advertising.

There are a lot of different rules/regulations that pertain to advertising. Make sure you’re following them.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Proper Networking and Email Formats

2006-03-16T15:17:00.000-05:00

Often times when sifting through networks, I see some extremely terrible things. Just as your clothing offline shows how professional you are, your typing and email formats show how professional you are online.

Many of us have read the basic networking tips, what to do and what not to do. What's spam, what's not. Although there are several tips you hardly ever see, and need to be mentioned. These apply to every day conversation as well as ads.

The following is a list of things to avoid when networking and sending emails:

1. Grammar and Spelling
Nothing bugs me more than to see grammar mistakes. Some are forgivable, as I know we all make mistakes. However, some are deliberate or signs of laziness. I don't ever expect someone to spell check a reply on a group, but using capital letters at the beginning of sentences and periods shouldn't be left out. Also things like "u" instead of "you" are unacceptable. Message boards and groups are NOT chat rooms.

2. Using All Caps
This tends to fall into the grammar and spelling category, but I thought I would make mention of it alone. Online, the use of caps is translation for shouting. If you need to get a point across, by all means shout. Just don't write your entire message in caps (or vise versa - refer to the tip above).

3. Excessive Exclamation Marks
This mostly applies to ads, since I know we can get excited when talking to fellow WAHMs on a casual level. I absolutely cringe when I read an ad with (!!!!) after every sentence. This is probably because I learned early excessive exclamation marks is a huge no-no in ad writing. It indicates hype, and no one wants to read pure hype. One exclamation mark is good enough, and more is unprofessional.

4. Fancy Stationery
It might look neat to you, but extremely irritating to others. You wouldn't see an envelope covered with stickers from your electric company would you? Or a statement from your bank on pretty stationery that says "I don't do mornings". Not only that, but many groups and email programs will reject the code for the stationery. I can't tell you how many messages I've seen on Yahoo Groups that start out with "XYZ Stationery Header". That doesn't look professional at all. Save the fancy stationery for your personal mail.

5. Arguments
We all feel the need to put our two cents in sometimes, although while networking with business it's usually not a good idea. Unless it specifically concerns you, try to stay out of arguments and heated discussions. There's a time to say something and a time to keep quiet. Knowing the difference is the only way to improve your networking status.

There are many other "no-no's" that we see on a regular basis, but the ones listed above are the top mistakes many networkers make. Don't forget - your emails and words are a direct reflection of your business online!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Importance of Offering Team Incentives

2006-03-10T09:00:00.000-05:00

If your team is growing but not staying motivated, one of the best ways to kick them into gear is to offer an incentive. By offering an incentive you are not only helping your team stay motivated, but in return helping your own business. Working towards a tangible goal can be a very powerful thing!

Here are some ideas for goals you can set for your team:

- Top monthly sales
- Top quarterly sales
- Most recruits in one month
- Reaching a set sales goal in a month
- Reaching personal goals
- Advancing in company ranking

Incentives come in many forms. While many would appreciate a company discount, others may like different types of gifts. After all, being in the company they are already getting products at a discount, right?

Gifts do not always have to be expensive, but should reflect the goal you have set for them. If the prize is offered monthly, the gift should be small. If it's a larger, long term goal, something a tad more expensive would be better. Remember though, it's the thought that counts and what appears to be expensive doesn't have to BE expensive.

Some ideas for incentives include:

- Candles
- Gift Certificates
- Jewelry
- Products from your other businesses
- Personalized Products

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Needing incentives for your team? DirectSalesHelpers.com offers personalized candles at http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com/candles.htm

Locating Local Craft Shows

2006-03-02T07:49:00.000-05:00

It's that time of year again! Christmas is over and the weather is starting to get warm, which means craft shows are starting to be scheduled. Are you ready to start looking for events?

We all know how profitable a craft show can be. Offline events are perfect for getting the word out about your business and making new contacts. What could be better than hundreds of shoppers walking right up to you and saying hello?

The most difficult part of a craft show is actually locating them before all the tables are booked. If you have never attended an event before, be prepared to spend several shows stuffed in the very back at a last minute table. Many of us start out like this, but as soon as you get on "the lists", your table location WILL be better.

The following idea for locating events is brand new, and given to us by a "neighbor" at our last craft show. While chatting with her, she pulls out a book and asked if we had this. It was titled "Iowa Calendar of Events", and was FULL of events for all over the state. Granted there were many events that do not accept vendors (theater dates, car shows, etc), but the list of shows that did accept vendors was amazing. All events were listed by date, complete with location and contact information. Perfect!

While this information might have been great for us being in Iowa, you might ask what good does it do for the rest of you in different states. I'll tell you - this booklet was free from our travel information website. All we had to do is go online and request a free copy. Iowa has a very limited amount of sights to see, yet we still have a travel website. This to me says other states have the same kind of information on website or with local offices.

There's a few ways to find out if your state has information like this:

- Check your state website
Often times the travel and event information will be right on your government website.

- Search online
Use terms like "travel" or "tourism" with your state to see if there's a specific website.

- Local offices
If all else fails, contact your state government offices to see if anything in print is offered.

Even in a small state like Iowa, we were able to find a list that will keep us booked every month for the entire craft fair season. Once you have your information, the easy part is contacting those on the list. Easy!

---------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. If you need additional help with booking and attending offline events, visit: http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/offline-events.html

Recruiting with FAQ – Part Two

2006-02-21T07:06:00.000-05:00

Knowing what the potential recruit needs/wants to know is half the battle. What do the recruits want to know?

First and foremost there’s nothing better than stating the obvious here but, greet your potential recruit and thank them for their interest. After that it’s best to give a little background about the company. By doing this you’ll be making the recruit feel comfortable with the company itself and gives her an idea of what your company stands for. It’s also nice to include your email address again right from the beginning, letting her know that if you did miss a question she may have you’re available and ready to answer it for her.

Using www.EasyBakeGreetings.com as an example this is what I tell my potential recruits upfront. Feel free to use these and adjust them to fit your business.

1. What are Greeting Cakes?
Hopefully if your recruit has even made it this far they already know what your product is, but just incase…let them know.

2. How do I become a distributor?
Spell it out step by step (leaving no stone unturned out). Do they need to purchase a start up kit? What forms need filled out?

3. Why do I need to fill out a W-9?
Don’t let recruits in the dark why certain forms are needed. Explain why the company wants this information. What is it going to be used for?

4. What is included in my distributor kit?
If your company requires a start-up kit (distributor, consultant etc kits), let recruits know exactly what they’re going to be getting and how much it costs. Even though we know that startup prices shouldn’t be one of the most important deciding factors but truth be told we all know it is. If someone can’t afford the distributor kit, they just can’t. Also be sure to mention if you have a program available to “earn their kit”.

5. What are my tax requirements?
Oh now isn’t this a fun aspect of the business? Of course it’s not and some of us probably even hate the word “tax”. But, it is extremely important! There’s even some direct sales companies that are not allowed in certain states due to certain laws. Let your potential recruit know anything you do. Don’t be a tax advisor or a lawyer…just the facts. And always, always recommend that each recruit checks with his/her respective states for sure.

6. What are the Sales Quotas?
This of course is a handy little detail that you’re going to want recruits to know. There’s a lot of direct sales companies out there and a lot of them with different sales quotas. Monthly, quarterly, yearly or maybe even non-existent. This will most likely be an important deciding factor for the recruit.

7. How long does it take to get an order?
I know this can often be a difficult answer to make because everyone will be having their products delivered to different parts of the country or in some cases different parts of the world. The best way I’ve found to answer this question is like this: “Products are shipped from Any City, Any State and I live in Your City, Your State. I usually receive my orders XXX amount of time after I’ve placed my orders.” State how long it usually takes you to receive your goods and the company’s shipping policy. Use the following statement as an example:

“XXX Company does their very best to make sure all orders are shipped within 48 – 72 hours.”

8. How are my cakes shipped?
This question of course can be answered with the above question or all by itself. This pretty much depends on your company’s policies or how many options customers may have. Let your recruits know in advance how their products are shipped. Are they shipped UPS, USPS, FedEx etc.?

9. What if I have a problem with my order?
Well, let’s hope there never are any problems but, let’s also be realistic. They happen. So just incase of any misfortunate events; let recruits know what they can expect to be done. Who do they contact and how?

10. Does the company drop ship my orders to my customers?
This can often be a major deciding factor also. Some wish not to handle the products at all. Then there are others who have to have complete control and want to know what’s going on at each step.

11. What commission am I paid?
Well let’s just say if this question wasn’t answered … you might as well not have even wasted your time. This of course is usually one of the first and the largest questions of them all. Besides, we’re going into business to make money, right? I’ve seen quite a few payment structures from quite a few different direct sales companies in my lifetime and let me just say that sometimes I’d rather read “The 10 Million Laws of Complicated Physics”. Of course I’m joking but sometimes they are really hard to understand. If you do have a complicated payment structure, try to spell it out as easily as possible.

12. How am I paid?
Of course this also could be incorporated into the above question but, if you feel the need, separate the two so there isn’t any confusion. Are they paid “instantly” or once a month? Are distributors paid actual paper checks, paypal or direct deposit?

13. How do you (me) sell the cakes?
I personally like answering this question for my potential recruits. I’m often asked how I sell them. What works for me? I think this is a legitimate question. They don’t want to hear what “everyone’s” doing. They want to know what you do. You’re possibly going to be their mentor/supporter/trainer … they want to know how you handle business.

14. How much does the shipping and handling cost?
I myself have seen some outrageous prices on shipping and handling. These recruits probably have a pretty good idea as to if they’re going to be able to charge these costs. They usually have pretty basic idea of who they’re going to sell and if the price is reasonable. Who wants to join a company that they can’t move the merchandise?

15. Is there websites available or can I build my own?
Simply put there are a lot of variables in this and everyone has different wants/needs. Some businesses offer company websites while others don’t. Some potential recruits would rather have the company website while others don’t.

16. Where can I advertise?
Are they permitted to advertise online, offline etc.? Is there any restrictions, if so, list them.

17. How do I obtain printed materials? Catalogs, Business Cards, etc.?
Can distributors/reps/consultants etc. produce their own marketing tools? Do they have to purchase them from the company? Can they have someone else produce them? If you do have to purchase materials from the company, what do they cost?

18. How often are new items released?
Is your company the type that is always brining in new merchandise or is it basically the same thing all the time?

19. How distributors are there?
Everyone has their reasoning for this question. Sometimes they’d rather new “stomping ground” or sometimes they’d rather a company with a bunch of representatives “under their belt”.

20. What kind of training/support does the company provide?
This very well could be a “biggie”. Sometimes these people who are researching companies are brand spanking new to the direct sales industry. As “seasoned pros” at this we often forget what it was like when we first started and didn’t know anything. We tend to assume that people just “know how to do it”. Which isn’t always the case. So for some, added training/support is definitely a Huge benefit. Does the company offer training? Do you offer something in addition? What is it? How often? And anything else you can possibly offer. Remember, you’re counting on their success too.

Whatever you do; don’t try to make your business sound as the “best”. Just because it’s right for you; doesn’t necessarily mean its right for everyone. You don’t want to spend your time with someone whose heart just isn’t in it. You’ll go much farther working with those who are.

The basic concept behind this is to let everyone know exactly what is and will be expected of them if they should choose this company. If the facts are straight right from the beginning, there shouldn’t be any problems.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Recruiting with FAQ – Part One

2006-02-21T07:02:00.000-05:00

As most of us know recruiting in direct sales plays a very large role. Don’t make them search or ask for the information they want … hand it to them on a silver platter.

The first thing I do is make FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) and answers easily attainable. By doing this you’re killing three birds with one stone.

First of all your potential recruit may be “shy” and not want to ask certain questions for the fear of being a “pain” or they may think their questions are “dumb”. (My answer to this is that the only “dumb questions” are the ones that go un-answered because they were never asked.)

Another “bird killed” is … Doing this saves you time. How many times have you been asked the same questions, over and over again? Starting to feel like a broken record? Start a list of these questions and answer each one.

Lastly and probably the most important reason for this is I don’t know about you but, I’d certainly rather someone know exactly what they’re getting into before they join. Just because your business is perfect for you doesn’t necessarily mean it is perfect for everyone. Everyone has their own reasons for joining or not joining and they vary from person to person. I don’t want to spend my time training/supporting someone in a business that’s really not for them. Doing this is just a waist of yours and their precious time. I want to make sure each recruit knows exactly what they’re getting into BEFORE they sign on the dotted line.

What do you do with your FAQ?

1. If you own and update your own website, place your FAQ’s right on your website. Place it right on the same page as the description of your business opportunity or put it on its own page linked from your business opportunity page. A small example of this can be viewed at http://www.easybakegreetings.com/distributor.html#faq

2.Place a “request more info” link on your site for potential recruits to email you for more information. Place your FAQ’s in a word document and email those to potential recruits as an attachment.

3. You can take it one step further if you’d like to add a personal touch and the added bonus of a visual aid. Purchase folders from places such as OfficeMax.com. I use Esselte Double Pocket Leatherine Portfolios. These have a special spot for your business card, look very nice and are fairly inexpensive. (25 pack for $12.99) When a potential recruit asks for more information simply print out your FAQ’s and mail them off.

You can view an example of what I do at http://www.easybakegreetings.com/distributor-info.html

Knowing what the potential recruit needs/wants to know is half the battle. Next time we’ll discuss what recruits are asking and a few things they shouldn’t have to ask for.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Why YOU Need a Marketing Plan

2006-02-17T07:33:00.000-05:00

Being in direct sales can often give the feeling "I don't have to do much, just sell". It's true, you don't have to ship orders or create websites, or even design catalogs (even though we recommend it sometimes). Your job as the rep is to direct customers to products, that's it. The fact is, to 'sell' the product is the hardest part.

Because "just selling" is more complicated than it seems, it's important to you to have a marketing plan. First of course you will need to set goals, so you know where you want to be by a set time. The next part is deciding on how to get there.

A marketing plan should include the following:

- What types of marketing ideas you plan to use
This would be ideas such as purchasing ads, hosting parties online and offline, networking, having your own newsletter, etc.

- Why you want to use these forms of marketing
Of course our main objective is to gain more sales, right? Dig a little deeper on these different forms of marketing to really see WHY you are going to use these forms. You may want to host an offline party to not only make sales, but to book more shows. You want a newsletter to keep customers informed of new products and specials, to convince them to buy.

- How you are going to follow through on the ideas
Just having them down on paper doesn't do you much good. If you want to have several online parties, write down how you plan to pull in visitors. If you want to use a newsletter (highly recommended), write down how you plan to gain subscribers and what will go into your newsletter.

- Schedules
Don't overwhelm yourself - make a schedule of what type of promotion you'll be using first. If you want to have an online party, start your newsletter first. While I know you want to have that party, it's important to do other things first so you are ready and have the best attendance possible.

Don't skip this important step to succeeding with your company! Even though you are "just selling", having a marketing plan can make it much easier to do your job.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Will Your Business Survive Summer Break?

2006-02-17T07:31:00.000-05:00

Summer is approaching and soon the children will be out of school. Is your schedule ready?

Some of you may know from past years, when the kids are out for the summer your "quiet time" during school hours is no more. Here are some tips to keep the school age children busy while you keep up with your business:

1. Plan family days
Take a day each week to spend the entire day with your kids. Make it a weekly event. Do things such as go out for ice cream, going to the zoo, etc. Try to plan it for in the middle of the week.

2. Set aside nights and weekends
In addition to your weekly outings with the kids, make sure you set aside your evenings and weekends to focus on them.

3. Hire Local Neighborhood Kids
Is there a responsible child in your neighborhood? Hire them to take your children to the pool, the park, or other areas in the neighborhood. Preteens are always looking for a way to make some extra money, or someone to pay for their day at the pool.

4. Have crafts and movies lined up
Avoid the "I'm bored" comments by having several activities set aside for children to do for at least 2 hours, giving you enough time to finish a project or two.

5. Take breaks outside
Since the weather is nice, children will be begging to go out. Make sure you take a break daily to go out for even just an hour. Remind them when it's time to go back inside they will be able to go out again when you are finished working.

6. Trade Babysitting
Talk to other mothers in your community and trade babysitting. Remember the first tip? Take someone else's kids on your family day out, and ask if they will watch your children on another day.

7. Hire Babysitters
When all else fails and you need to get major work done, send them to daycare once a week. Don't feel guilty - it's only one day! Your kids need a break from you too sometimes, and the chance to play with other children.

Good luck surviving the summer, and don't forget to enjoy it yourself!

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

The Truth About Contests

2006-02-17T07:30:00.000-05:00

Often times you'll see the tip "run a contest to get more sales!", and general tips on how to do it, but there's some facts you should know before holding your own.

I've seen countless "sign up to our newsletter and be entered into our monthly contest" and see them submitted to various contest sites. Have you ever ran a contest like this? If you have you know that it will probably bring you several hundred new subscribers. Sounds like a great idea right? Wrong. While you may have hundreds of new subscribers, you have very little that are interested in buying anything from you. What you have is a list of people that are looking to WIN something, and want something for free. That's why they are on these lists you submitted your contest to - because they hope they will win free products and not have to pay for any of it. You on the other hand want BUYERS, not freebie seekers. Not to say there is something wrong with being a freebie seeker (I think we all love to get free items, and are always on the look out for deals like this!), but they are not your target market.

While contests can be a good thing and DO build your list, understand the conversion rate for a freebie seeker list is very, very low compared to one that is made up of current customers and people honestly interested in your product. While these aren't exact numbers and you will need to run your own test, it may take 1,000 subscribers on a freebie list to gain one extra sale while a list of 100 targeted subscribers may produce 2-3 sales. Quite a difference right?

Recently I ran a contest with my freebie seeker list. I offered a free product to the name drawn from those who suggested scents for candles. This list had produced little sales in the past, but as soon as I offered something free - they responded. Out of 800 subscribers, there were over 30 entries. One person was selected as the winner, and the rest were contacted personally (twice actually) to be give a coupon, plus state their scent chosen was available. Over 30 people were contacted personally, and told their recommended product was available. This experiment produced zero sales. Yes this is correct - zero. It was a fact - these people didn't want to BUY, they wanted to WIN.

So if in the future you are thinking of running a contest for your business, attract only those that want to buy even if it's in the future. Here are some recommended contests to attract only buyers:

- Questionnaire
Something such as "why you would like to buy and why". This can also be used to help determine what your target market is looking for, and what you could do differently to increase sales.

- Purchase to Win
All purchases made in the month are entered to win. You could get creative with this idea, and state higher purchased amounts get more entries. For example, $1-10 spent = 1 entry, $11-20 spent = 2 entries.

- Gift Registry
Have them fill out their gift registry with your site, complete with a list of friends and relatives that would buy your products FOR them. This costs them nothing, they are still getting their products for free, and you are making the sale. You could also give everyone they mark down the chance to win as well.

There are many other ideas that can be used with a current list or to gain new customers. Just be sure that any type of contest you are involved in does bring you buyers!

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Are You In the Right Business?

2006-02-17T07:27:00.000-05:00

Often times we see of people struggling with their online businesses, and while normally it's marketing related problems, the real problem may be you are in the wrong business.

There's thousands of articles on how to promote your business, and other related materials, but very little on how to choose your business. The normal response to a request for information on starting a business is glowing recommendations from current reps and how fabulous their opportunities is. The problem is, while they may be in the perfect business for them it may not be the perfect business for you. Thus causing problems later on.

You may have been given advice before you started on how to choose your business. You may have heard "go with your passion, you need to love the products!". Some may not have heard this at all, but joined your business because of the compensation plan. While both of these points are important, they aren't the only thing you should look at when joining a company.

Some may want to promote only online, but the company prevents this. Some companies deal mostly online while you want to take your business offline. Being in this situation can hold you back, and there are just too many options for direct sales companies to settle on one that restricts you.

If you feel you are struggling due to being in the wrong type of business, take a step back. Act as though you have no business, and are looking for the first time. What are you looking for in a business? What type of products do you like? You can download our free ebook, Choosing Your Direct Sales Business for help with questions to ask yourself:
http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com/free-ebook.html

After you have answered some of the most important questions and realized exactly what type of business you should be in, compare it to your current business. Does it match up, or is the company you are in the cause of your major problems? Now it's not to say this company is BAD - it's just not the right fit for you. For example, if you are with a company that deals mostly online, this company would be perfect for those that do not like to promote offline, but of course not good for those that do.

There are literally hundreds of direct sales companies and more opening every day. You can find just about any product with direct sales - from candles, to food, to greeting cards, and even decorative bags! Succeeding with one is just a matter of finding the one that matches you and your needs.

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Making the Sale When the Customer Won't Buy

2006-02-17T07:23:00.000-05:00

Ever had a party online or offline, and had guests say "I love that item, but I can't afford it right now", or "It's so hard to decide, I want all of this!". This is a perfect time to sell all those items to your customer without them having to pay a dime.

If you aren't using this idea already, make sure to put it into action immediately. Have a gift registry form ready to point those customers to should they want extra items they simply can not buy right now.

What they do is fill out their information, special dates (Birthdays, Anniversary, etc), and the products they want. Then, they fill out names and contact information of relatives and friends they know they will be receiving gifts from. You contact the relatives, stating where you received their information and what's on the wish list you hold. Ask them if they would like a reminder before the special date, and which item they will be purchasing.

Simple eh? It's a win-win situation for everyone! You make the extra sale, the gift-giver knows they are buying a gift the other person wants (no guess work or wandering around a mall!), and the one receiving the gift is getting exactly what they wanted but couldn't afford.

This idea works easily both online and offline. Keep several forms handy if you are offline, so you can pass them out at parties or events (Pre-made forms available with the Direct Sales Success Kit). Online you will want to set up a page with an automatic form for your guest to fill out. For an example of an online form, visit:
http://www.soy-wax-candles.com/gift-registry.html

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Avoid Losing Sales This Summer - 6 Easy Steps

2006-02-17T07:21:00.000-05:00

It's a fact - the online world dies down in the summer time. Kids are out of school, families are on vacation, there's fairs to attend to, and many are just spending too much time outside to be online. For those that market mostly online, the summer months could be eating your profit. The good news is, it's easy to take your product to where your market is - offline.

While some of you may moan and groan about leaving the comfort of your home to make money, if you don't want to loose out on sales it's the only way. Also you will get a chance to meet some local people in your area, and getting out can be good for you!

So what is there to do offline in the summer time? PLENTY! There are hundreds of events going on right under your nose, just waiting for you to be a part of. State fair, county fairs, town celebrations, music events, craft fairs, expos - all renting tables and spaces for you to sell. The hard part of marketing the events has been done for you, all you have to do is show up!

Use the following 6 steps to make your offline event a success:

1. Locate the events
This isn't as hard as some make it out to be. There are many different ways to get in touch with those in charge of organizing events. Check with your local City Hall or Chamber of Commerse first.

2. Get Ready for the Event
Make a list of items you will need to take, plus take inventory of the products you have in stock. You'll need a good variety and some eye catching items to take with you.

3. Set Up Your Table
Your table should be neat, but eye catching. Table clothes are a must! Don't forget to have a drawing box on the table as well, to catch leads.

4. Attend the Event
You will need to have someone at the table at all times. Don't leave - not even for a second - unless there is someone there to cover you.

5. Take Notes
Was there something you could have done differently? Take notes and do better next time!

6. Follow Up
As they always say, the money is in the follow up! Be sure to stay in touch with all those contacts you made at the event.

More information and help on staying organized while attending local events can be found at http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com/offline-events.html

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Online Parties with a Twist

2006-02-17T07:19:00.000-05:00

We know once you have a room full of guests at your online party, getting them to play games is the easy part. While hunting for answers to your game, a guest has the chance to see some products they simply cannot do without, thus making you sales!

We also know from experience that getting the visitors to the party in the first place is like pulling teeth. We have given some ideas to increase your party and really being able to talk with your future customers in a chat room is the best. However, for those that you'll never see in the chat room here is a way to increase some party-like sales without having to hold an actual party.

After you build your list of potential customers (and if you don't have one - stop right here and do that FIRST. YOUR list of potential customers is your most valuable asset in business!), play a game with them via email. Announce on a Monday or even Friday (and you can test which days get the best responses) the start of a contest by email. Focus on a specific type of products like you would at your party, and set up some type of questions that can be emailed to you. Be sure to cover some good points about your products in a casual way (you know your subscribers want to get down to the contest part of this, so don't overload them with ads!). You can set this up in any way you wish really, just as long as it's something interactive you can do with them.

At the end of the week, send out another email with the answers (this might grab a few that didn't participate before, or maybe got stumped and you never got an entry from). Give the details again of the products, which the answers were related to, and also be sure to announce the winner. You can possibly even give a special incentive to buy the products you featured in the contest, since many of your subscribers have been eyeing these products all week - a special might just give them the extra push to buy.

You can do variations of this, such as having weekly-featured products and instead of giving away prizes each week having a monthly drawing where those that win the weekly contests are entered in. Just as long as you are doing something other than just "weekly sales" you will stand out of the crowd and increase your sales!

------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

4 Tips to More Online Party Sales

2006-02-17T07:16:00.000-05:00

I know most of us have held our own online party, been to one, or at least read about them. Many of the materials online are general, and the average online party (for individuals) has around 5-10 guests at the most. Maybe more, maybe less, depending on several factors. But really for those that do not belong to party groups, and are holding their first party the attendance is going to be very low.

After some thought, I realized the way we are holding these parties is wrong. In our previous article we talked about stepping out of the wahm zone, and searching for your specific customers. When looking for guests for your online party, it should be no different. Instead of mass submitting party invites to wahm groups, let's take a step back and see what should be done FIRST.

1. BUILD a newsletter
Before you have your next party or even start to plan it, set up a newsletter. This is something you should have already for your business, no matter if it's an informational newsletter or one that lists your specials - you NEED a list of potential customers. If you haven't started to build one, start now! I could go into detail as to HOW, but newsletters are an entirely different subject of their own.

2. USE your newsletter list
No I don't mean take advantage of them, but I do mean send your party notices to your list. Your list is the most important, targeted sources of free advertisement you have!

3. Give good REASONS to attend
Simply saying "online party - join us" isn't enough. Not even saying "games and prizes" is enough anymore. Get creative and have a good reason for having your party. Such as announcing a new product not released yet, giving away free items (be specific in your email!), or featuring a specific type of product on your website. Informational chats are good as well, such as one that explains what a certain non-familiar product is.

4. Make a SCHEDULE
If you have monthly parties introducing or featuring specific products, the attendance is going to be better than if you just have them at random. Weekly is the best for repeat guests, but you also do not want to burn your guests out offering them the same products. Monthly would work best, since it's not as often but still creates that habit. Make sure you have it on the same day every month (such as the 1st, 10th, 15th...something easy to remember).

Don't forget to get creative with your parties! With so many offering online parties today, you really need to make yourself stand out. Granted if you do follow the first two steps, you WILL have a much better response since instead of just other wahms you will have a targeted group that may not be familiar with online parties. Even still, there is always room for improvement. ;)

Good luck with your next online party!

-----------------------------------------------------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of Direct Sales Success, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Direct Sales Reps CAN Write Articles - Here's How!

2006-02-08T12:56:00.000-05:00

We all know that article writing is a great way to promote our businesses AND helps establish us as an expert in our fields. But, just because we know how important it is to our business doesn’t necessarily make us able to do it. It’s often said, “I’m not a writer, I can’t write articles.” Or “I can’t write an article about my own products without it sounding like an ad.” Do either of these sound familiar?

Here’s a twist on article writing that can both help and provide a little extra fun. Find another consultant from another non-competing direct sales company. Exchange products with each other and both of you try them each out. Once you have tried the product yourself, write an article about it. In return the other consultant does the same thing. It’s much more natural for us to be able to write about and recommend someone else’s products. It’s a win-win situation!

The following is perfect example of an article that was written about a gift from another direct sales company rep:
http://www.mommyshelperonline.com/rainy-day-cakes.html

Don't forget to add your resource box to the end of your article, and remind them to do the same. So really you are getting twice the advertising as you would just writing your own article! Not to mention you have a "testimony" that's not an ad and being used as content on other sites.

Pull up your address book and start figuring who you can exchange products with. Try to find others that have similar but not competitive products. Such as if you sell home decor with no candles, find someone that has candles.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

3 Steps to Finding New Customers

2006-02-03T07:57:00.000-05:00

Step one: Knowing your Customer
To find your ideal customer, you first have to know them. Other than the fact your future customer wants your products, what else do you know about them? Ask yourself some of the following questions:

1. What hobbies do your customers have?
2. Do they have children?
3. Do they prefer buying online or offline?
4. What are their fears/concerns?
5. What makes them happy?

Step two: Finding Your Ideal Customer
The next step is a piece of cake! Once you discover what your ideal customer's interests hobbies, and lifestyle is, finding them is the easy part. There are TONS of message boards, groups, newsletters, and websites dedicated to specific groups of people. You can do some research to find these places on Yahoo Groups, Ezine Directories, or just by searching.

Step three: Discover Your Own Interests
Take a minute to realise your own hobbies and interests. Do you like to read and sell coffee or candles? Join a message board that talks about books and get to know others there. Make sure to put your business in your signature line! Use a creative ad such as "Relax with a cup of (your company's name) coffee and a good book", or "Relax with a (company name) scented candle and a good book". Try and get as creative as possible so your signature line really stands out and makes other want to click.

Also be sure to ask yourself why you joined this particular business to begin with (aside from the money!). Sometimes this will give you ideas of where your customers could be. For example, if you joined a bath and body company because of your concern for the use of store brand soaps on your children, you may consider seeking out a group or message board of other mothers that share your same concern. Again, be sure to use signature lines targeted to those who your products are targeted to!

Of course this is just the beginning. While you may choose to pay for simple advertising on some websites and newsletters (and this is fine!), if you are involved in the community be respectful to the current members. Don't just place ads and leave, but instead get to know those in the community. Follow the rules as you should within any community - don't post with the assumption everyone will automatically buy from you. Build relationships, be helpful, and the sales will follow!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Stepping Outside the WAHM Zone

2006-02-03T07:54:00.000-05:00

Often times on message boards you'll see several reps from the same company, making it difficult for all reps to gain enough sales. We've also seen issues where some reps dominate certain boards or even go so far as to steal potential customers and recruits. While there is no real easy answer to this problem, there are certain things you can do to gain your fair share of sales.

But wait, if there are at least 2 or 3 other reps from the same company on all the top wahm message boards you visit, how are you going to gain all the sales possible?

Very easily - visiting at least ONE message board that isn't related to the wahm community. Believe it or not, there ARE message boards our there that don't have anything to do with business! We aren't saying you shouldn't be a member of a wahm community, because this is important to your growth as a business woman and DOES have major benefits to you. However, advertising to others in business is not going to create the most sales for you. What will create more sales is being an active member of a community that's filled with your potential customers without a competitor in sight.

Finding other communties outside the wahm community isn't as difficult as you think. There are many, many other kinds of groups, message boards, and websites that could be of interest to you and your future customer. Take a minute to do some non-business surfing on the web and see what you come up with.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

6 Time Management Tips for Moms

2006-02-03T07:10:00.000-05:00

Many of you have expressed the challenge of not having enough time to accomplish all your needed tasks and not being organized. Having good organization and management skills is absolutely imperative to your business. Being well organized can greatly affect your successfulness. Applying a few of the following tips will help you become more organized and make better use of your time.

1. Learn to delegate
Most of us are mothers and as moms we tend to automatically take on everything and are used to doing everything ourselves. There's absolutely nothing wrong with delegating different tasks.

2. Set business hours
One way to keep yourself and your business organized is to set regular business hours. You know Monday through Friday 1 - 4 or whatever times works best for you and your family and try to stick to it as much as possible.

3. Keep your office organized
Have a place for everything keeping like things together.

4. Group like activities/errands
Keep track of errands that need done and try scheduling most of them on the same day.

5. To-do lists
Having a to-do list keeps you motivated and lets you know what needs done at all times.

6. Plan for tomorrow
Make it a habit to review the following days schedule at the end of each day.

Take a few minutes right now and start a list of everything you need to get done. Take that list and re-write it by placing the things that most need accomplished and place them at the top of your list. Once you're finished get back to work and cross off tasks as you go. Not only will you find yourself getting more accomplished you'll also find a sense of fulfillment.

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

Reaching Goals in Direct Sales

2006-02-03T06:44:00.000-05:00

From surveys and experience, we've noticed many setting excellent goals for their business. We've also noticed that while the goals being set are good, the results aren't. Around 90% of those in Direct Sales do SET goals, but never reach them.

So the question comes to mind.....are you making the right plans to reach your goals? It's GREAT to set a certain amount you want to make, so you have a little motivation, but without the proper planning reaching that goal is going to be more difficult.

Ask yourself the following questions:

What have you done in the past that created sales?
How can you improve on ideas for creating sales?
What ideas for sales have you seen but not tried?

Take a minute to write down every way you can think of to make your sales (such as through parties, catalog shows, drawings, etc), then make some more specific goals for doing each task. Such as "contact 10 people and book at least 3 shows".

Once you have a plan in motion, be sure to stick with it! A dream won't become reality if you are just simply wishing for it.

If you have an idea of how to get to your goal, well that's half the battle. The next part of course is taking action. You should have your goals AND plans clearly written in a place you can see. It's true everyone has their own way of setting and reaching goals, which is fine, but everyone needs to have them BOTH written down in some way.

If you don't have a goal or even a plan, now is a perfect time to start!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.

4 Tips for Keeping a Team Motivated

2006-02-02T15:30:00.000-05:00

Companies often have incentives for reps, but sometimes that isn't enough. To keep your team motivated, you could do a number of things:

1. Hold your own personal incentive for your team
This could be something as simple as a gift certificate for the one who sells the most in a month.

2. Set up a message board just for your personal team
A great way to keep in contact with everyone. Many wahm boards already have a section for your company, so if you don't have the time to set up your own you could use a specific board for your team.

3. Send out a monthly newsletter to your team
Keep it personal and let them know how you are doing ... motivate them by explaining some of the ways you have advanced during the month.

4. Contact your downline on a monthly basis
Personally contact everyone and see how they are doing. This is a good idea even if some in your team are making sales without your help. Just check in and see if anyone has questions or problems - they may be afraid to ask for help.

These are just a few things that you can do to keep your team motivated. Be creative and personal, this is always the best way to go!

-----------------
Anita DeFrank & Kara Kelso, authors of The Direct Sales Success Kit, specialize in coaching direct sales representatives to reach their goal of becoming successful in their field. Visit http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com for free weekly tips.