Prospecting your niche markets and discovering your pathways to success

Many distributors often ask if it is more effective to lead with product or opportunity in their prospecting conversations.

I believe that the most effective prospecting conversations lead with the relationship first.

It is only by creating a relationship first that your prospect will be willing to listen to what you have to offer with regard to your product or opportunity. The secret, then, is how do we best build rapport, create an opening to be heard and appreciated, and build the relationship?

As network marketers, we typically feel more powerful with some people or in some arenas more than others. Often times, success in building a prosperous network marketing business is greatly facilitated by identifying your own power niches where you can most rapidly build a relationship or establish a common interest.

Allow me to explain.

Developing commonality with others is one of the keys to developing rapport. And rapport is a critical element necessary if you are to be truly heard and appreciated by your prospect. To the extent that your prospects “get” that you are interested in them and have things in common with them, they are more likely to be willing to listen to what you have to say.

So, to maximize this advantage from the start, why not seek out those individuals with whom you have one or more items in common.

Let’s start by Identifying Some Areas of Commonality The following list can serve as a starting place to begin to explore those arenas in which you are likely to find others with common interests and backgrounds.

Make a list of as many prospects as possible with the following items in common:

Profession Work background Religion Ethnic or racial group Club membership School class Language Special interest or skill Common challenges Geographic location Childhood affiliation Mutual friends or acquaintances Family ties Favorite charity Political or other affiliation Parents with college tuition bills People working two jobs And, the list goes on and on.

The idea is to begin to look for those with whom you share some bond. If you are a teacher, you know all of the challenges that teachers as a profession are likely to face. Identify why your opportunity would be appealing to teachers, gaining clarity on the specific benefits to this group. Then go after them, speaking your commitment to support teachers in becoming financially independent. For example, you might offer the benefit of being able to teach out of choice or teaching because they love to work as a teacher rather than because they need to in order to survive.

Taylor your benefits and approach to highlight each group’s special needs and desires. This same principle applies to any niche market or group.

For example, if your company offers an oral health care line, target dentists, hygienists and those concerned with maintaining optimum dental and periodontal health.

Focus on the benefits of your product line and opportunity as it relates to those in the profession. With this focus, you might speak to dentists and hygienists about office wellness centers, the treatment of halitosis, periodontal management, secondary income streams in the practice, staff profit sharing programs, a colleague referral program, the tax advantages of a networking business, and practicing ideal dentistry out of choice instead of obligation. You get the idea. With this type of laser focus, you will likely attract thousands of dental professionals who share these challenges in their practices and their lives.

Likewise, if you market a pet care product line, target veterinarians, groomers, veterinary technicians, and pet owners with all of the benefits of interest to these groups.

With a weight loss product line, target both men and women with concerns about either eliminating those unwanted pounds or gaining more energy, a group that excludes very few.

If you offer an air purification line, you might target realtors (who would see great increases in home sales) pet owners, smokers, and others who wish to eliminate odors from their homes and offices while improving air quality. Each product line has particular appeal to a certain group of individuals. By focusing in on these markets, product interest and prospecting success dramatically increases.

The same concept applies to other areas of mutuality. If you speak French, target others who speak French. Let them know that you are seeking bilingual leaders. Advertise in French publications; seek out French speaking clubs and organizations.

Go where you are likely to find your ideal prospect.

Do you have a favorite cause to support? Identify why others with your interest would want to join you in business. Set a goal of speaking to, say, 500 individuals with this focus over the next two to six months. Remember to ground your action plan to be in line with where you expect to be in the future. When you focus on the ideal prospect you want to attract, you may be surprised to see these very people show up in droves.

Create a Unique Selling Proposition Pertinent To Your Target Market Begin by making a list of all of the features of your company, product lines and business plan that would be attractive to those you are targeting. The features are those items about you and your company, opportunity, products, compensation plan, etc.

Each feature provides your prospect with a certain benefit. It is these benefits that you will speak about to interest your prospects.

Benefits are about the prospect, something of value that’s in it for them.

For example, your weight loss product may have some particular ingredients that make them unique or effective. The ingredients are features; the fact that the product can help your prospects lose weight or gain energy is an important benefit that would be of interest to them. Always speak in terms of benefits and back these benefits up with features.

As you speak to more and more prospects in each niche market, you will gain more and more insight into the challenges, needs and desires of that group. This knowledge will assist you in continually tweaking your presentation to better hone in on what is of interest to them.

Speak to Your Niche’s Concerns and Pain, Hopes and Dreams

Your effectiveness will come in identifying the “seeds of discontent” or what’s not working in your prospects’ lives for them.

Whether it is too little time to spend with their families, not enough money to live the life they once dreamed of living, the stress of providing a quality education for their children or any other problem they are faced with solving, your job is to identify the pain in their lives and look with them to see if what you are offering might shift them out of the situation.

When you are able to create an opening for them to see a possibility with your opportunity or product, you have taken the first step in creating an opening to be heard. With this knowledge, you can look to contribute to their lives, creating rich possibilities for them to step into.

When you become adept at creating these rich possibilities for your niche group, you will find your business will begin to grow rapidly.

Create a Game Plan and Track Your Results You will not necessarily know which niche will provide you with the greatest success until you track your results. Commit to prospecting a sizeable number of individuals, say 50-100 to start, in each of 2 to 4 different niche markets. Perhaps these niches might include your work group or profession, your church group, your school class, your children’s soccer team’s parents or your club list. Decide how many hours per week you can devote to your prospecting efforts. Commit to a Single Daily Action that consists of a minimum number of daily conversations you will make day in and day out in each of your niche groups.

Buy a spiral bound notebook, which you will use as your journal and record the following statistics in it on a daily basis:

• -Date of the conversation • -The name, address, phone, fax, email address and any other

pertinent information about the prospect

• -How you obtained the prospect’s name (in other words, which ad

did he answer, was he a referral from a friend or business associate, was he a warm market contact, or did you obtain his name from another source?)

• -Also record important facts about the prospect including family,

occupation, where he or she lives, hobbies, areas of interest, concerns and challenges

Answer the following questions to gage your progress:

• -Did you develop rapport and get to know your prospect

sufficiently?

• -Did you create an opening to share what you have to offer and

actually be heard?

• -Did you identify what was important or missing in his or her life? • -Did you create value and rich possibilities? • -Did he or she get that you are successful and your commitment

is to support him or her in being successful?

And for every conversation, remember to ask:

• -What worked? and • -What was missing that, if put into place, would make the next

prospecting conversation more effective?

Be creative in obtaining your prospect leads. Perhaps many will come from your warm market consisting of those people you know or know of or those who know of you. Others may come from ads targeting the specific type of prospect you are seeking. Advertise for chiropractors in a chiropractic journal and for Spanish speaking individuals in a Hispanic language newspaper, etc. Prospect for men with ads in men’s magazines and for powerful women in magazines that they read. Ask those in positions of credibility and authority with the group you seek to suggest ways to target them.

Also, remember that everyone is most powerful and productive when following a pathway or structure that makes winning easier. The value of the pathway will often times be in direct proportion to both your ability to create rich possibilities for your prospect while showing them an access to how they too can succeed if they join you. Also important are factors that contribute to easily developing rapport and commonality with your prospects. If they can get to know you, like you and trust you, you will be much closer to enrolling them.

Some pathways might include any of the following. Please refer to this list in your workbook and make note of any pathways that you may wish to test market. Some of these pathways might include:

• -Friends, family and Warm Market contact lists. • -Referral Marketing or folks referred to you by those you know or

meet.

• -Classified Ads in local, regional, national and niche market

newspapers and magazines

• -Company sponsored or Upline Co-operative ads • -Trade Shows or Health Fairs • -Hosting Business Opportunity Meetings • -Trade specific Opportunity Meetings • -Home Parties • -Targeting a Niche Group with which you have something in

common

• -Getting Published in magazines, newspapers and journals • -Submitting press releases featuring hot topics of interest which

relate to your products or business opportunity

• -Speaking before groups or organizations • -Working a product approach in a particular niche market (for

example – offering air purifiers to bars, restaurants, hotels or pet owners.

• -Cold calling, whether done in person or by phone • -Faxing after calling to request permission to send the fax along. • -Building on the internet through chat room prospecting, opt-in

email, ezine ads, banners or in other ways.

• -Writing or sponsoring an Internet Newsletter mailed to a list of

subscribers

• -Offering a free sample of an appropriate product. • -Targeting businesses that can offer your product to their

customers.

• -Prospecting an ethnic group you have credibility with. • -Prospecting with Direct mail, be it with postcards, letters,

catalogs, audio-tapes, flyers or mailers.

So, take on the following exercise:

In the next 30 days, commit to having a minimum of 100 conversations with prospects in 2 to 4 niches. Prospect this group by obtaining your names while working in 2 to 4 different pathways. Continue to do this for at least the next 500 prospecting conversations in any number of niche markets while following your chosen pathways.

Track your results as you go so that you will be able to soon have hard numbers that will tell you which niche markets and which pathways are the most effective for you. Once you identify your most productive niche markets and pathways, you will focus more of your efforts there while continuing to experiment with other markets and pathways, always tracking your numbers as you go. As you perform your Single Daily Actions, having a minimum number of quality conversations each and every day, week and month, remember to develop rapport, create rich possibilities and always look to contribute to the other person and you will be well on your way to achieving network marketing success.

Dr. Joe Rubino is an internationally acclaimed network marketing and personal development trainer, life-changing success and life-optimization coach and best selling author of 9 books and 2 tape sets on topics ranging from how to achieve network marketing success, personal and leadership development to restoring self-esteem and maximizing business productivity. An acclaimed speaker and course leader, he is known for his work in developing Network Marketing leaders, leadership development, listening and communication skills, life and business coaching and team building.

His best selling books and tapes are available in 19 languages and in 48 countries. These include:

--Secrets Of Building A Million-Dollar Network-Marketing Organization From A Guy Who’s Been There Done That And Shows You How To Do It, Too --10 Weeks to Network Marketing Success: The Secrets to Launching Your Very Own Million-Dollar Organization in a 10-Week Business Building and Personal Development Self-Study Course --The 7 Step System to Building a $1,000,000 Network Marketing Dynasty --The Ultimate Guide to Network Marketing --15 Secrets Every Network Marketer Must Know --The Self-Esteem Book: The Ultimate Guide to Boost the Most Important Ingredient for Success and Happiness in Life --The Magic Lantern: A Fable About Leadership, Personal Excellence And Empowerment --The Success Code, Books I and II --Secret #1: Self-Motivation Affirmations CD Set Financially free as a result of building a top Network Marketing business and retired from his very successful, million-dollar dental practice at the age of 37, Dr Rubino is the CEO of The Center for Personal Reinvention, Http://www.CenterForPersonalReinvention.com, an organization committed to the personal excellence and empowerment of all people. He has impacted the lives of more than 2 million people through personal and leadership development. Dr. Rubino was featured on the cover of Success Magazine in December of 1995 and in their cover story, “We Create Millionaires: How Network Marketing’s Entrepreneurial Elite Are Creating Fortunes at Break-neck Speed” for his ability to impact people’s lives. He is featured in the hit new movie, The Opus. He is a certified success coach in life planning technology and the co-developer of the life-changing course, Conversations for Success, a program that provides participants with the tools to maximize their self-esteem, productivity and personal effectiveness with others. His vision is to personally impact the lives of twenty million people to be their best and to shift the paradigm around resignation - that is, that anyone can affect positive change in their own lives and in the lives of others - if they believe they can.

Dr. Joe offers powerful personal coaching to support Network Marketing business success and life fulfillment. To contact him, call 888-821-3135 or email Joe@theselfesteembook.com . Learn more about his life- changing work in championing people to restore their self-esteem at http://www.SelfEsteemSystem.com.