You are considering starting a network marketing opportunity or maybe your already involved in one. Either way, if you are going to be successful in network marketing, you need to understand the basics.

Why the network marketing business model exists in the first place…

Network marketing, otherwise known as MLM, is a great way for the average person to earn extra income or even become wealthy.

The network marketing industry boasts tons of opportunity for anyone looking to generate money based upon their own efforts.

A company that institutes the network marketing business model can easily become as popular or even more popular than mainstream companies who pay millions of dollars in upfront advertising costs. These companies will still pay the millions of dollars that would have normally gone to advertising agencies, but not till after the sale is made. This makes network marketing a genius business model. Although this industry has gotten bad press in recent years, it is still a viable legitimate way to earn a real income.

The reason some people feel that network marketing is not legitimate is simply because many of these people have tried network marketing before and failed miserably. They did not fail because they were not capable of success. In most cases people got into the MLM opportunity they were involved with thinking that they were going to make easy money with very little effort. Anything worthwhile takes effort. This is something that everybody should know that sometimes gets lost in the high created by the opportunity itself or the upline.

The best ways to promote a network marketing opportunity in 2010…

the old-fashioned way of building a network marketing organization still works. I am not going to tell you that go into your warm market is a bad idea like so many are saying today. After all, if the company you are associated with has good products, why would you not share them with everyone you know?

Do you tell people about the restaurants you enjoy?

Do you tell people about the products that make a real difference in your life?

Well, your warm market is the best place to start.

At the same time, technology has made it possible to easily attract those outside of our warm market to whatever opportunity we are affiliated with.

A marketing system is a must if you are going to streamline the business building process.

Here is the way that you look at your marketing funnel… your website is the central part of a bicycle wheel. The rubber part of the wheel is your market, both whole prospects as well as warm. The spokes of the wheel are all of the different ways that you market your opportunity. All of the spokes are connected to your marketing system or website. You must have a mechanism in place to capture your prospects information so that they can be followed up with at a later point in time. You must also have a way to automate the follow-up process through e-mail at the very least. If you’re building a network marketing business, it is recommended to get the prospects phone number so that you can follow-up with them once they have completed the requirements that you set up.

An example of this would be, once they fill out your capture form and get the first autoresponder message, you call them on the phone to see if they have any questions and let them know that you are available.

One of the biggest mistakes that network marketers make is trying to convince their prospects to join their business. Our job as network marketers is not to convince anybody. Our job is to simply inform and educate the prospect about our business. Let the prospect make the decision based upon the follow-up messages that he or she receives. Whenever you contact the prospect you need to realize that you are in complete control of the conversation. Someone who controls the conversation does not talk a lot. You simply asked the prospect if they have any questions and let them direct the conversation keeping you in control by allowing them to express the questions or concerns that they may have. This drives the conversation and takes the pressure off of you. The most important thing you can do is to realize your job is not to sell anything. Your job is to listen, answer questions, and educate your prospect about the business.

As far as marketing itself goes, there are numerous ways to get the word out about your opportunity. There’s a lot of talk going on nowadays about attraction marketing and using the Internet as the sole resource of attracting prospects. This is a valid way to get people interested in your opportunity and in you as a person. It is not however the only way to market your business and in less you know exactly what you’re doing when it comes to attraction marketing, it can be a very difficult strategy to implement.

A great way to market your MLM business is by passing out sizzle cards but not in the traditional sense. Get a couple of thousand cards per month and put them on people’s doors at their houses or better yet knock on the door introduce yourself to the prospect. If you pass out a couple of thousand sizzle cards every month you will build a huge organization and make your financial dreams your life very quickly.

I have built my business both on the Internet as well as off-line and off line hands down is the best way to build an organization that has synergy and is focused and committed to one goal. If you use the Internet as your only source, you are going to find that many of your prospects that turned to business builders are not really all that serious about the business. That is why I use the double-edged sword approach to marketing my business. I market both on the Internet as well as off-line and as I said, in my experience off-line is best if you want to build an organization that duplicates.

The reason why is simple. Not everyone has the ability or the time that it takes to market online successfully. If you don’t think it takes time to market your business online, you are dead wrong. Anyone can be trained locally however to pass out postcards or contact their warm market. If you train your team locally in teach your team to hold each other accountable, you are building synergy which will ultimately be the driving force of growth in your organization. Don’t get me wrong, you can build a huge team in the Internet as well, but why not use both strategies simultaneously.

Leadership is an important quality if you want to set yourself apart in this industry. You can set yourself apart and become wildly successful, but it has to be something that you instill within yourself in the very fabric of who you are. Yes a network marketing business does take work, but how cool would it be to retire in five years or less never have to worry about money again. I recommend that you come up with a five-year plan to build a network marketing organization that will allow you to have complete financial freedom by the end of the period. If you commit to this business, you must do so in deed, not just words. So many people in this industry get involved thinking that is more like the lottery than a business. Here is the reality! If you treat this business like what you invested in starting it, you will never be successful. Network marketing can pay you millions of dollars, so treat your business like it is $1 million business and not a hobby that you do whatever you feel like it if ever at all.