97 percent

I received an email this week that included the line:

“the only people on your list who are worth anything to you are the people who actually buy what you’re selling”

Now this may be true to an extent, and taking a literal interpretation of the word “worth”, but the attitude contained within that single line sums up a lot of what is wrong with the online home business industry.

The line itself was part of an email that, ultimately, was trying to sell me something; surprisingly enough, some “secrets” from some “leading marketer” that I’ve never heard of. That’s fine, I can accept it is being used as a marketing device, but it places total emphasis on people who earn you money right now, completely disregarding those people who, basically, haven’t acted quickly enough to hand over some cash to you.

This approach works well if you’re selling affiliate products in a targeted niche, but it’s the way this type of advice will be applied within Network Marketing that really bothers me. It’s the type of advice that reinforces the “only 3% will make it” myth, and writes off the importance and potential of 97% of us. It also, indirectly, reinforces the myth that you have to be “ruthless” to succeed; you don’t.

I don’t know about you, but I would hesitate to do business with people who espouse this type of attitude/advice.

I have Richard Branson to thank for this article headline, the phrase comes from his book “Business Stripped Bare”. He was talking about the way the mobile phone industry had created layers of technical jargon, tarifs that made no sense, and various lock-in techniques. The phrase “Confusion Marketing” was coined to sum up how some businesses generate and retain clients by confusing and bewildering them.

It dawned on me that Sir Richard could easily have been talking about the online marketing and online network marketing business. I could waffle on for ages on this subject, and that would perhaps be somewhat ironic in the context of the subject. But rather than that, here’s my take on “Confusion Marketing” as it can be applied to the home business world:

Network marketing is a very simple model where you find a product you like, become a “distributor” and tell people about it. The final aspect is why it is important that you have a product/company you truly believe in; if you have found the right products for you, then it’s very easy to sing praises.

So what has happened in the online network marketing world? An entire tools and information industry has been spawned, and often the only information you get is how to sell the tools and information you subscribed to. We have seen an explosion in “Attraction Marketing” systems and courses, and people are getting more and more bewildered by the things they are being told to do; set up blogs, create landing pages, learn how to run a Google ad campaign, learn how to test web traffic etc. etc.

These things are great, and in the right hands they can be powerful additions to any business, but every day I see people complaining about how things are too hard, how they don’t understand some of the technical jargon, and in many cases how they don’t have time to learn these compex things. The problem, as I see it anyway,  is how people are starting to think these things are essential, and a home business can’t be successful without them.

That’s the “confusion marketing” kicking in – people have been battered with so much information, they truly believe they need to subscribe to various sites, buy a number of tools to help them and follow some strategy or other based on attraction marketing principles.

Strip it all back to basics and you are left with a simple reality; find a product you like, become a distributor, tell people…

Home Business – a lot gets talked about it online, and it certainly attracts its fair share of hype. Who hasn’t seen the promises of getting very rich, very quick, and for very little effort?

But wait a moment, Home Business is not a new thing, it’s just taken different forms over the years. Perhaps taking a moment to think about this will help put some fears and misconceptions aside.

Anyone of a certain age will probably remember their mother (or maybe an aunt, or even a family friend) running a catalogue. More specifically, a mail order catalogue, selling anything from clothing to Christmas hampers. If you do remembersuch a thing, you probably also remember the catalogue being passed around friends and family, with a orders for anything people wanted being placed on a regular basis.

The goods would arrive and would then be passed on to whoever ordered them. The catalogue would also offer a weekly payment plan, making things more affordable. Your mother (or aunt, friend etc.) would do all the work of passing around the catalogue, taking orders, taking payments and distributing packages when they arrived. In return for this, they earned a small commission on every sale made through them.

So, who remembers this? Who though has made a connection between online network marketing (or any marketing) with the old catalogue idea? The catalogue was an early form of home business!

Now why am I mentioning this? Well, think back again – whoever it was you can remember operating a business like this, can you remember them saying “this is going to make me a millionaire” ? You didn’t hear that, did you? These people were running the catalogue business for 2 reasons; firstly as a service to their friends and relatives, and secondly to make a little extra cash and make life a little bit easier.

So why do people avoid pushing this line with network marketing? Why do people insist on selling the dream of joining the super rich club? The truth is, I don’t really know, because I believe that is a legitimate reason for getting into this kind of thing!

So if you take anything from this article, then let it be this – operating a home business may well turn you into a millionaire, but it doesn’t have to! Earning a few extra bucks is pretty useful in its own right.