What Is Network Marketing and Why Should I Care?
Saturday, June 7th, 2008This is the first post in a series about network marketing.
When people ask me what I do for a living, my typical response goes something like this: “You know how most households are struggling financially, barely getting by, even with two or more incomes? Well, I teach people how to leverage their time and effort to produce the financial freedom they so desperately want.” In a nutshell, this is the power and the promise of network marketing.
Since 2002 I have been involved in several network marketing enterprises. Some have come and gone, and a few have stood the test of time. This series of posts will ultimately become the basis of an e-book on How to Choose the Right Network Marketing Opportunity for You.
So what is network marketing? The traditional business model is to develop a product and then market it through various distribution channels: national wholesalers, regional distribution centers, local retailers, along with a hefty advertising budget. In recent decades, more and more companies have begun marketing their products through a network of independent associates in a direct-to-consumer model that bypasses all the middlemen. And instead of spending a fortune on advertising, those monies are distributed to the associates in the form of commissions, remunerating them for their word-of-mouth advertising . . . which is essentially what network marketing is.
Network marketing is a subset of the direct sales industry. Typically, network marketers receive commissions for their own efforts, along with commission overrides for the efforts of the associates that they introduce to their businesses. This results in residual income that can grow over time and become quite substantial. In many cases, these residual income streams can be willed to your heirs and continue indefinitely. Now that’s leverage!
And that is precisely why you should care about network marketing. Even if you enjoy your current job, you should give serious consideration to augmenting its linear stream of income with something more residual and powerful in the long run.
That’s enough for now. Feel free to add your comments below. They are sure to influence my future posts.