I’ll bet that the first time you ever heard of MLM, the word “duplication” wasn’t far behind.
It’s long been accepted as gospel that for big success in MLM, you must have duplication. But the fact is, mindless duplication can cost you a lot of money.
Back in 1989, I was reading the business opportunity ads in the weekend edition of USA Today. I circled a few ads and called one in particular. I got a voice mail message and left my contact information. The message offered me a free audiotape. The ad wasn’t specific. I didn’t know what it was about until I got the tape in the mail.
So I listened to the tape. It was by a fellow by the name of Dayle Maloney. You may well know Dayle, an old-time MLMer, very successful.
I Wanted Nothing To Do With MLM
I had been there and done that and had been killed a number of times in MLM. So I wanted nothing to do with it back in the late 80’s. But I listened to Dayle’s tape and he had some interesting ideas. One thing in particular he said just stuck with me. What Dayle said was that if you are ever going to make it big in THIS business, if you are ever going to be a player in network marketing, you’ve got to do your own audiotape. You HAVE to do your own audiotape. There’s no argument – you just have to.
And that thought stuck with me. So a few years later, I was in a position where I had found an MLM product that I thought was outstanding. I figured if there was ever any product I could sell, it would be that one. I very definitely remembered what Dayle said. So I wrote a script and then rented studio time and recorded a 90-minute audiotape. And I had good success with it.
Over the next few years, I did 6 or 8 different audiotapes. And every one of them built a business for me. Most of them were scripted. Some of them, I recorded with other people. The technology is obviously different today. I am not telling you that you have to do an audiotape today, because you don’t.
But To Have Major Network Marketing Success, You Need To Brand Yourself
That first audiotape set me apart from others in the business. There were quite a few MLM audiotapes at that time, but even so, anyone who actually did one, who took the time and learned enough to do it … it branded them, set them apart, differentiated them.
And as I built my business, that tape gave my people an exclusive tool to use that nobody else had. (THAT is where the duplication comes in!) And it made it easier for me to recruit to build the business, because I have this tool that nobody else had. In MLM, you are always talking about how important duplication is. And it definitely is important. You’ve got to have a system that duplicates that other people can use.
But if you are ever going to be the big leader who has the huge success, who makes the really big money, you also have to differentiate yourself. You have to brand yourself somehow. Figure out a unique message and a unique way to deliver it … video, podcast, email, conference call … figure out something that makes you different. You have to decide how you are going to do that. You have to both duplicate and differentiate … and then network marketing becomes a REALLY interesting and fun game.
