Your First 90 Days in Network Marketing: What to Do

Today, I want to talk about what to do during your first 90 days in network marketing.

One of the biggest factors for your long-term success in our industry is how you START your business. It’s vital to get off to a quick start to (1) build your belief, (2) develop a good story or testimonial, and (3) earn a good income. It’s also better to start right than be forced to start over, later on down the road.

In the paragraphs below, I will share some of my best tips and strategies you can follow during your first 90 days in network marketing.

Your First 90 Days in Network Marketing

Here are my best tips.

# 1: Try Out a Bunch of Products

When you first join your company, place a big first order. Don’t just order the minimum. Try out a bunch of different products. You want to find out which products you like best and how much you like them. If you only order one product you won’t be very familiar with the company’s product line. Order at least five to ten products with your first order and try new products every month, for your first few months.

This will help you build up your product story and it will give you a better understanding of how the products work. Most companies offer a 30 to 60-day money back guarantee, so if you find a product you don’t like just return it and get your money back.

Remember, if the products don’t make sense, neither will the business! You should also sign up for auto-ship. It’s a must do if you are really serious about building a successful network marketing business.

# 2: Determine Your Why

You’ve probably heard people talk about this concept before. Determining your WHY is very important. Your why is WHY you are doing the business. Maybe it’s to earn an extra $500 per month so your wife can stay home with the kids. Maybe your why is to earn an extra $1,000 per month to save for retirement. Maybe your why is to create a Plan B, so you have options a few years down the road.

Whatever your WHY is, write it down on paper. Post it on the fridge. Keep a copy of it in your wallet. Keep a copy by your nightstand. Read it daily. This will keep you going through the good times and bad times. Without a strong why there’s a good chance you will give up and quit your business within your first 90 days. Don’t underestimate the power of writing down your WHY.

# 3: Set Your Goals

The next thing you want to do during your first 90 days in network marketing is to set some business goals. All businesses need goals to shoot for. At a bare bones minimum you should have 30-day, 60-day and 90-day goals. Write down how many people you want to sponsor, what rank you want to achieve, how big you want your team to be, and how much money you want to make. Write all of this down on a piece of paper and share it with your spouse and sponsor. This will be your guidepost, what you are aiming to achieve.

# 4: Develop a Daily Game-Plan

Your next step is to develop your plan of action. Think of this as your marketing or business building strategy. Talk with your sponsor and upline and find out how THEY build the business. Check out a few different ways of building the business and pick ONE method that makes sense to you, that you feel comfortable doing. Examples might include home parties, events, one-on-ones, Facebook, or something else.

Your game plan should be simple and easy to follow. Ultimately, you want to come up with two or three activities that you must do every day to move your business forward. An example game plan might be to prospect two new strangers, call three leads, and follow-up with one person.

# 5: Make a Commitment

Without a doubt this is where most people in our industry mess up. Regardless of how big or how small your goals are, you need to make a commitment to stick with the business. Rome was not built in one day. Good things take time. It takes time to build a successful business of any type, especially a new business.

Make a commitment to stick to your game-plan MINIMUM one to two YEARS. If you have the attitude that you are going to just try it out or dabble with it, do yourself a favor and quit now. If you started any other type of home business you wouldn’t dabble with it. You wouldn’t start a restaurant and dabble with it. You wouldn’t open a convenience store and dabble with it. Make a commitment! Be part-time with a full-time attitude.

# 6: Order Your Business Tools

All business owners need tools. A carpenter has their hammer, nails, tape measure, and saw. As a network marketer you should have some basic business building tools. This includes business cards, a day planner, samples, information brochures, prospecting CDs, a script, and more. These tools will help you grow your business. Don’t be cheap in the tools department. You want tools that can do the heavy lifting for you. If you don’t know what tools to get, ask your successful upline.

# 7: Get Plugged In 

Your next objective is to get plugged in to your upline’s system. This is nothing more than their methodology of building the business. The team probably has a training manual, an email distribution list, weekly calls, local meetings, and more. Your goal is to plug in to this training. It’s designed to keep you motivated, teach you the ropes, and help you get started right.

You might not use this system forever, but I think it’s important to follow your upline’s system, especially if you’ve never done MLM before. If your sponsor (or upline) doesn’t bring it up, just ask them what you need to do to get plugged in. They will point you in the right direction.

# 8: Schedule Business Hours

The next thing you want to is set scheduled business hours. If you’re like most people, you have a job and other responsibilities. That being said, if you want your business to grow you have to set aside some time to work your business every day, even if it’s just thirty minutes a day. Set aside a set time you can work the business. Do it during your lunch break. Another option is to get up an hour earlier or stay up an hour later. Make the time to work on your business every single day. Success won’t happen by accident. Just find a set time each day that works for you and stick with that.

I recommend you do this each Sunday night. Go somewhere quiet, take out your day planner, and plan out your upcoming week. Determine what days, times, and activities you will work your business. This will make life simpler and easier for you.

# 9: Work On Your Personal Development

I believe you should work on your personal development beginning your first day in the business. Read books and enroll in automobile university. Learn everything you can about selling, marketing, leadership, communication, team building, and network marketing. Be a student of your business. That’s what successful business owners do. They study everything they can about their industry, and they try to improve a little bit each day.

Make a commitment to read at least 15-minutes every day. While you are in your car (or truck) replace the radio station with training CDs and business CDs. This will help you become success minded and will help you develop your skills.

The quickest way to make more money in this industry is to improve your skills.

# 10: Find a Mentor

In most cases, you’ll start out working with your sponsor. That’s great. If they’ve already quit the business since they sponsored you (this is quite common) find someone in your upline who is successful and willing to help you get started.

If your sponsor is clueless, call upline until you find someone who knows what they are doing. You want a mentor to help you during your first few months. It really does make a difference.

Your mentor will give you guidance and feedback. They will help you grow and solve your own problems. They will teach you what right looks like.

# 11: Contact Everyone On Your Name’s List

One of your first projects in the business is to make your name’s list. If you can’t come up with at least 500 names, I don’t think you are putting enough effort into it. Having a name’s list of 50 to 100 people is better than nothing, but the bigger the name list the better.

If you come up with a big name’s list, you should find plenty of people to become customers and distributors on your team. Make it a point to contact at least five to ten people a day (from people on your name’s list).

Get through the names as quickly as possible. This will help you get off to a great start.

When you talk to people lead with the products. You will get less resistance and you will find more people who are interested (not everyone is entrepreneurial).

If you’re wondering where to find names, write down all of your Facebook friends, email contacts, phone contacts, and LinkedIn contacts. For most people that is at least 3k to 5,000 names. Start with those people first.

# 12: Develop Your Product & Business Success Story

Your goal is to get off to a fast start. Remember, this will be the story that you share with other team members in the future. You want to set the pace for your group. You want to create some momentum in your team.

What should you expect in your first 90 days? Well, if you follow the advice mentioned above I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to sponsor at least 6 to 12 people AND find five to ten customers within your first few months. Yes, individual results will vary. But I’ve never met anyone who was serious, committed and DID THE WORK that didn’t get positive results.

I’ve met a lot of folks who did nothing, and as a result, got bad results. Getting off to a fast start will position you for long-term success with your company.

# 13: Be a Sponge

Your goal is to be a sponge and learn everything you can. Learn from your mistakes. Learn from your coach and upline support team. Learn from books, videos, podcasts, webinars, conference calls, and one-on-one training. Most people spend four YEARS in college learning BEFORE they can even apply for a real job. Most traditional jobs have an orientation and training period. Accept that you will need to go to MLM School for your first three to twelve months in the business while you learn the ropes of the business. If you’ve never done the industry before there will be a learning curve. Embrace it and learn everything you can.

# 14: Have Fun!

Have fun. If you aren’t having fun, you aren’t doing the business the right way. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Don’t make the business high stress. Realize upfront that you have a lot to learn and that you will make some mistakes as you learn. Look at each day and each experience as an opportunity to learn something new.

Final Thoughts

There you have it folks. These are my best tips covering what you should do your first 90 days in network marketing.  I believe that if you follow this advice you will get off to a solid start that will allow you continued success in the business.

Remember, your first 90 days are critical. More importantly, when you sponsor other people into the business their first 90 days are also critical. Make sure you have a game-plan for yourself, and for your team.

What are your thoughts? What do you think people should do their first 90 days in network marketing?  Leave a comment below to let me know what you think.  I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Chuck Holmes
Network Marketing Professional (21+ years)
Top Recruiter & Top Rep
mrchuckholmes@gmail.com

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