Are you still trying to find the best mlm leads? When it comes to success in any network marketing business, there can be no denying that the top of your priority list should be prospecting.
Prospecting is a term used to describe the act of seeking out new customers and/or distributors to join your network marketing business, whether as customers or fellow distributors. When you stop prospecting, your business stops growing.
Opinions on the best way to handle prospecting appear to be clearly divided between two camps:
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- Warm Market: This is when you approach friends and family about your new product, service, or opportunity. Friends and family are considered to be “warm” because they already know you and will, hopefully, trust you enough to listen to your presentation. Often times, new network marketers discover that friends and family can often be the most resistant and even hostile to the idea of looking at your new network marketing business.Sometimes, your friends and family may have good reason to be skeptical. If you have bounced from one program to the other and you are still not making any money, your friends and family are going to be very hard to persuade.
- Cold Market: This is when you approach complete strangers about your network marketing venture. This can be done via online advertising, newspaper ads, postcards, handing out business cards, or just walking up to complete strangers and asking them to sample your products.
Which of these two methods do you personally find to be most effective in your own mlm business?
The best MLM Leads you will ever find are those you generate yourself, either in your warm market or your cold market. Personally, I have used both methods effectively over the years. I talk to friends about my products and services when I identify someone that may make a good customer or distributor for my teams.
I’ve been known to strike up conversations with complete strangers after a gig, at a bar, restaurant, sporting event, mall, etc… Sometimes, I get a new customer. Sometimes, I get a new distributor. Sometimes, I get ignored and/or rejected entirely! But I’m pretty outgoing and I really enjoy talking to people. Either way, I’m having a good time when I do it.
I think my favorite approach, though, is my online lead generation strategy where I use online advertising to find people that want to know more. The advertising sends them to my . They can fill out the form to request more information and from there, my AutoResponder takes over with sending followup messages, inviting them to view online video presentations, etc…
By the time I actually speak to or hear from one of my online prospects, they are pretty well ready to get started. They just want to talk a bit, get some answers, and get a feel for what it might be like to work with me.
The point is … each of these methods is effective when done consistently. Choose one. Choose the other. Choose both. But DO them consistently to build your business and you will win!
Which method(s) do you prefer to build your prospect lists?
My personal favorite is to use in conjunction with online advertising, SEO, PPC, etc… to generate targeted prospects.
This way, I don’t have to face the typical rejection that we get from our “warm market”. When someone contacts me to learn more about my network marketing offer, the hard part is already done. My next step is to just follow up and help them make the decision that is right for them.
Brian Rooney
TrafficWave.net LLC
I agree with Brian Rooney this is the best way to go.
I find family & friends far to negative “Oh that won’t work”
“Aren’t a computer genius” and it goes on.
So I go for cold Marketing.
You must have an autoresponder, then advertise like crazy.
This way you build a “list” then you build your rep and trust
with these people.
Keep an eye out for an upcoming article on the importance of list building in your network marketing business!
Warm Market is very hard to conquer (my thought) and that’s why I prefer cold market more than warm market. I’m marketing using social media as my main approach. I can see it real potential for long term goal. What I’ve to do is share my idea with people and when they see I’m reliable they’ll easily follow my lead. Just my 2 cent.
I prefer the online method of building prospects as my friends and family think I’m a bit crazy for doing MLM. And yes, using an autoresponder so that you can keep in touch with those prospects is the best way to go.
Salley
PS Like the new look of TOAN
I hear you, Salley! Do you find that the friends and family are a little more receptive when they see success with your online approach?
For me, it became easier to talk with friends and family once I started demonstrating some success with the online side.
I guess if I enjoyed tapping the “warm market” I’d be happily selling Amway or something like that… which I tried in the past, but found it did not work with my personality.
I like to create products and build membership sites around them, then use list building to bring in new leads, and to work with existing members/subscribers. I also provide tools and training for my members to do the same, if they choose.
Since I started in MLM in graduate school I was always told to “go to my warm market first.” All that really accomplished for me was a few sales and lots of unsavory comments and jokes. Personally I think there is value to the “warm market” but I think when people have some success to speak of, it is much easier to approach their warm market and show them what they are doing and how they are doing it. Most people you will be approaching will not be too receptive to immediately calling all their friends and family. Have some success then go to the warm market.
Like Carol above I did the “warm market” thing with Amway for many years without much success (I didn’t know how to even switch on a computer in those days so really had no choice)! Fortunately my job allowed me to make lots of Amway sales
and to be profitable. Using The Online Ad Network and the Traffic Wave Autoresponder has made approaching unknown prospects so easy so I must thank Brian for making these tools not only available but affordable!
Keith Darby
It is a genuine pleasure, Keith. Glad to have you with us.
I LOVE online marketing. And using auto-responders works for me. Splash pages seem to
result in more response as well.
Good marketing materials, professionally done attracts folks as well.
I wasted a lot of time fiddling around trying to figure things out myself. Now I ask and have gathered a few good mentors around me. So appreciate the help.
TOAN provides training as well and Support has always been super when I contact them.
It’s ONLINE for me. So Cold market that you quickly warm up!
Thanks for this communication method.
Laura
Glad to have you with us, Laura! Thanks for sharing your experience.
My family and friends think I am mad trying to run an MLM. In my first ever MLM I sold my sister “something”, it stopped working about the time the company went bust, and she kept it on the sideboard blinking balefully at me for months afterwards to remind me (and the rest of the family!) never to talk to her about my “schemes” again 🙁
Online for me every time, and TOAN is the best value way I know to spread the word far and wide.
Don’t bombard your friends and family with messages from your marketing lists. While you may love your work, you need to restrict your communication with your loved ones. Don’t let your excitement cause tension.
[…] Which Is Better – Cold or Warm Market? […]
So with cold market MLM lead generation strategies, you need to find a way of generating MLM leads that primarily focuses on building trust and rapport with your audience.