MLM Expert Advice

This is part 4 (of 5) of my synopsis of Michael Port’s Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting More Clients Than You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling covering the Web and Speaking Strategies.

12. The Book Yourself Solid Web Strategy – In order to be able to start and continue conversations with prospects a web presence is critical as it positions you as an expert, build your brand, has global reach, and provides a forum for self-expression and learning.  A website’s primary goal is to convert the traffic that lands on your site and in order to do this your website should include the information you want to present and be organized and labelled for easy navigation.  Remember to keep your target audience in mind while you build your site because they are the ones you are trying to attract and then convert from a prospect to a client.  In this chapter Michael presents a number of different website formats — the brochure, the menu of services, the testimonial, the portal etc. — allowing you to choose what best fits your audience and how you want to present to them.  Of course a website only can convert if traffic comes to it and Michael shares a few strategies for this such as:
    • Getting Listed in Search Engines through Site Optimization – build content-rich pages that are legitimately filled with keywords and phrases your target audience would use to find you and your offer.
    • Boost Your Link Popularity – create relationships with other sites that have good web traffic and status.
    • Leverage Your Signature – let people know what you have to offer or to sign up for your newsletter through by adding a link to your email signature.
    • Use Article Directories to Promote Your Site – articles can introduce readers to you by including a brief bio at the end of your article with a link back to your website.
    • Cross-Promote through Marketing Partners – promote others that you deem great and have them promote you making it easier to build relationships and prospects.

    But again even if you get the traffic you still need to convert it.  Michael provides five (5) principles for prospect conversion:

    • Enticement – offer something of value as soon as they arrive on your site in exchange for their email address and permission to contact
    • Consumption – follow up to help them make the most of your information
    • Endowment – give your services to qualified prospects
    • Enhancement – offer additional products/services that would be of further service to your clients
    • Abandonment – as people leave your site without purchasing you could ask them why
13. The Book Yourself Solid Speaking and Demonstrating Strategy – Another strategy to reach your target audience is to promote yourself or have others promote yourself.  The former can be of two types:
    • Conference Calls – monthly or weekly calls for clients to learn the benefits of working with you.  You need to prepare new, timely and relevant topics for each call.
    • Demonstrations/Educational Events – same as conference calls but in person.  Best suited for where your clients are located close to you.

    The latter, having others promote you involves presenting to associations or organizations.  Public speaking allows you to address prospects and interest them in your offerings.  Both you and the event organizers benefit, you get to market your offer and they get great content to satisfy their attendees.  Regardless of what type of audience you are presenting to keep your talk simple.  You need to teach your audience something they don’t know or haven’t realized yet.  Michael provides some guidelines to ensure you put out a good presentation:

    • Plan
    • Define your message
    • Know your audience
    • Choose your role
    • Know your materials
    • Be prepared
    • Organize your information

I will be covering the final two chapters on the Writing Strategy and Keep-in-Touch Strategy in my next article.

What I thought would be a 3 part summary of Michael Port’s Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting More Clients Than You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling looks like its going to be extended.  I’m finding so many great things in his book and this synopsis is barely covering it even with the detail I’m providing.  As before… onward and upward…

9. The Book Yourself Solid Networking Strategy – The rationale for networking is to freely and sincerely provide resources, knowledge, and information… with no strings attached.  This then allows you to build and deepen mutually beneficial relationships. Michael suggests focusing your networking equally on both clients and/or consumers (including prospects) as well as with other professionals where the latter provides a window for growth.  Share what and whom you know as well as how you feel.  Michael calls these intangibles and tells us that they should remind us to always increase our knowlege, thank those who have worked for you by providing them to others in business, and be fully present when networking.  Michael has some dos and don’ts keep in mind for networking events – first the Dos:
   • Be punctual and arrive on time
   • Be yourself and be relaxed
   • Smile and be friendly
   • Identify two or three things you would like to learn from others at the event
   • Ask for a business cared AND keep in touch

   and now for the don’ts

   • Don’t let what you do be the first question you ask
   • Don’t juggle multiple items
   • Don’t complain about networking or about the event

   Keeping in touch is imperative and if you don’t take the necessary actions than you have wasted the event.

10. The Book Yourself Solid Direct Outreach Strategy – This strategy is often employed while starting your business when you have to proactively reach out to prospects. Definitely do not send spam email to mailing lists or newsgroups.  As with all things it needs to be targeted, legitimate, and have value for it to be appreciated and acted upon. Direct outreach tools include:
    • Letters – great for initial connections but do your homework and find out everything you can about the person or company you are trying to reach.  Make it personalized and let them know your objectives at the onset.
    • Calls – used for following up with your prospects after you have permission to contact.  Calls should be brief, direct, and straightforward.
    • Emails – allow you to connect with prospects globally.  Should be used in conjunction with other direct outreach tools.
    • Postcards – work best when its requirements are free and easy and when you’re giving away something of value
    • Brochures and Flyers – should be made professionally to let your prospects know you deliver high quality service
    • Whatever-It Takes Direct Outreach – just what it says, whatever it akes to engage attention but it still needs to present you in a flattering light
11. The Book Yourself Solid Referral Strategy – Referral clients are often more consistent,  loyal and better for your business that any other client source.  Referral opportunities surround you but you may not notice or be aware of them.  To begin your referral process Michael provides 8 steps:
    • Step 1: Identify Your Clients’ Benefits – the reasons why your clients (consumers or business members work with you)
    • Step 2: Identify Why Others Would Refer Clients to You
    • Step 3: Identify the Types of Referrals You Seek
    • Step 4: Identify the Places Where Your References Meet Ideal Referrals – this will allow you to help your client understand who they know and where they will run into those who will benefit most from what you have to offer
    • Step 5: Clarify and Communicate How Your Referrers Make a Referral – you want to make sure that when they refer you they do it in a manner that sets you apart and connects you to the referral
    • Step 6: Ask for Referrals
    • Step 7: Facilitate the Referral Connection – offer to meet or advise anyone that is important to your clients
    • Step 8: Follow up with Referrals and Referrers – introduce referrals to what you have to offer in a helpful way and thank your referrers for the connection.

I will be concluding this synopsis with the final 3 chapters in my next article.  Obviously I can’t cover all of the great exercises that Michael Port has in his book so I will recommend you check it out.  Previously I suggested going to the bookstore but if funds are tight, read it in the bookstore and take good notes or check it out of your local library.

The more I read of this book the more I see the parallels between what I have been doing myself and what I have been suggesting that you need to do.  I left off at Chapter 5: Who Knows What You Know and Do They Like You?… so onward and upward.

6. The Book Yourself Solid Sales Cycle Process – Michael Port offers a sales cycle with six (6)  keys that help you determine what you should be offering your prospect
   • Key #1: Who Is Your Target Client or Customer? Identifying your target will allow you to focus on the emotional connection crucial in the initial development of a relationship with your prospect.
   • Key #2: What Are They Looking For? If you don’t know what they are looking for you won’t know what to offer them.
   • Key #3: When Do They Look For You? What needs to be happening to them personally or at work for them to want what you have?
   • Key #4: Where Do They Look For You? Do you know where your market searches to find what you offer?
   • Key #5: Why You? Why would they choose you?  What is unique about your offer?
   • Key #6: How Do You Want Them To Engage With You? Do you want them to call or sign up for a newsletter.  Most prospects need to get to know and trust you over time and communication is the first step.

   Michael suggests giving your prospects a risk free sample of your services so that they have an idea what you know and what its like having you provide products and services to them. The sales cycle itself has five stages:

   • Stage 1: Simple and measurable.  Most effective when used with a keep-in-touch plan. Your list is made up of people who have given you permission to contact them on and ongoing basis.
   • Stage 2: Demonstrate knowledge, solutions, and sincere desire to provide value to your target market at no cost. Prospects should find it risk-free.
   • Stage 3: Help prospects make the most of the information provided in stage 2 and make a sale by offering them a product that you believe they are ready for.
   • Stage 4: Go the extra mile with your prospects. If they bought some information from you offer them an invitation to a workshop or webinar on the same topic.  This allows you to offer the next level of your service.
   • Stage 5: Not everyone will complete the cycle at the same pace or at all. You are building trust over time.
7. The Power of Information Products – Nothing builds your credibility faster than products and services designed to server your target market’s needs and desires. Information products in the form of e-books, CDs, etc. allow you to express yourself and provide you with:
   • opportunities for multiple streams of passive income
   • enhanced credibility by establishing you as an expert
   • more consumers because they speed up the sales cycle
   • time leveraging giving you the opportunity to make additional income

   Keep in mind that the market size for people who will buy your informational product is much larger than those that are willing and able to buy your product or service. Your informational product should be something you are enthusiastic about. But no matter what the product is always keep in mind your target audience as it should meet their needs otherwise its futile.  Michael goes on to outline a few steps to developing your informational product:

   • Choose the role you will play – the expert or the researcher
   • Choose your product framework – modular or reference type
   • Choose a title that sells
   • Build your table of contents for ease of presentation and organization
   • Create your content
8. Super Simple Selling – If you’re uncomfortable with the sales process its likely you view it as unethical, manipulative, and/or dishonest. To change your perspective you have to let go of the notion you aren’t worthy of the money you are earning.  Successful people get paid for what they do.   The super simple selling system that Michael suggest requires a paradigm shift.  Stop thinking of selling as manipulating and simply presenting a canned presentation when the opposite is true.  To sell you need to become more polite, more considerate and more understanding.  You need to listen more to and consider the needs of your prospects, clients, and consumers putting their needs before your own and grasping the deeper meaning of what they are sharing with you.  Selling becomes an opportunity to provide them with the services that would take them to the next level.

Well thats all I had time to read today.  If you’re reading this synopsis and its resonating even slightly within you then you need to go to the bookstore and pick up Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting More Clients Than You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling by Michael Port.

I decided to catch up on some books I’ve been putting off reading because there always seemed to be something else that would be more productive.  The first one that caught my eye was Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting More Clients Than You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling by Michael Port.  This book fits well into what I have been writing about recently.

Michael, the creator of “Think Big Revolution” shares a turnkey system of getting new clients based on the Law of Reciprocity.  He has some invaluable tips and techniques as well as exercises that will help identify areas for growth.  He covers why people buy from you, how to develop your brand, and how to best market your product and services, all of which are easily translated to your MLM business.

I’ll try to summarize what Michael says; however, you really need to pick up the book and read it thoroughly if you’re serious about success.

1. The Red Velvet Rope Policy – Michael writes that you should select only those clients that energize and inspire you and enable you to grow and give your best.  Remember, you are the company you keep.
2. Why People Buy What You’re Selling – You need to know why people buy what you’re selling and you can accomplish this in four (4) steps
   • Step 1: Identify Your Target Market -figure out the group that you’re most passionate about serving because it will determine where to find potential clients
   • Step 2: Identify the Urgent Needs and Compelling Desires of Your Target Market – this is what prompts your market to go in search of your services
   • Step 3: Offer Investable Opportunities -your services and products should offer your clients a resasonable return on their investment
   • Step 4: Uncover and Demonstrate the Benefits of Your Investable – identifying benefits allows you to speak and be in tune with your target market on a deeper level
3. Develop a Personal Brand – Personal branding is how you want to be known in your market and should be not only compelling but unforgettable.  Your brand consists of two things:
   • Your “who and do what” statement lets others know exactly whom you help and what you can help them do.
   • Your “why you do it” statement differentiates you from the others who share the same business as you.  It says something about you and what drives you.
4. How to Talk About What You Do – While your “who ad do what” statement serves as a jump off point for conversation, the next step is to ensure that you captivate and actively engage the prospect in a conversation that elicits questions about what you do.  When specifying what you do and what you provide it should lead to a discussion that allows you to share your expertise.  Michael helps you build a template for long, mid-length, and short dialogue.  Practicing these dialogues will help you become comfortable in expressing yourself and what you do in any scenario.  The next step is to speak well and with enthusiasm because if you’re uninterested in what you do, why should any one else be.
5. Who Knows What You Know and Do They Like You? – It’s now time to establish yourself as a category authority, a well-known, well-liked, expert in your field. First there are the credibility builders and then there are standards of service.  While these don’t set you apart, savvy consumers will expect them.  But to truly become a category authority you need to learn everything you can about the one thing you’ve decided you want to become known for.  To start you need to identify what you’d like to be known for within your target market.  Michael provides you with several exercises to help you in the mental shift of starting to view yourself as a category authority. Lastly you need to be likeable because even if you are the worlds foremost authority, if no one likes you it will yield you little.

That’s it for now, I still need to read the rest of the book in order to summarize what Michael Port has to write and there are 14 chapters so there will probably be 2 more parts to this.