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Moments In The Zone
By Greg Arnold

Network Marketing is ever evolving.  In the past it truly was possible to be in the right place at the right time.  A little work applied to the mix and BOOM, instant organization.  Today, Network Marketing has much more to do with being a good businessperson than positioning.  The fact that it takes hard work applied consistently and persistently over time to build a winning business is a real plus for the industry.  The very fact that it isn’t “get rich quick” is a better perspective for those participating in Network Marketing and those watching it from the sidelines.

Attitude is important, but skills are king.  You don’t have to be great at every aspect of the business but you do have to be skilled.  You do have to know how to use the telephone as a tool.  You do need to know how to use direct mail.  You do need to know how to do home meetings and face-to-face one on ones.  Yes you should know something about prospecting and building on the Internet too.  These skills are important because your organization will not all fit into one mold.  If you ignore developing these skills, you will lose whole segments of distributors.  Remember, you don’t have to be great in all these areas, just skilled.

How do you obtain skills?  The best way is to have somebody with these skills teach you out in the field, where it counts most.  In the absence of that, attend a few seminars to learn the basic techniques.  The best teacher of all is to just do it.  Activity will breed knowledge but knowledge won’t necessarily breed activity.  You can’t find your own personal greatness in a book.  Get on the phone and make a bunch of calls.  Set some appointments and do some one on one, face-to-face prospecting.  Give presentations until your face turns blue.  Hold a bunch of, in home, opportunity meetings.  Mail cassettes to strangers and follow up on the phone.  Learn something about direct mail.  Put up a web page or have a web designer do it for you and ask your friends to go look at it.  Email your friends to go look at it.  Learn something about how the Internet works.  Get skilled in all aspects of your business.  As you build your team, they will be asking you how to do these things.  Have the answers.  Greatness comes from you stepping outside your comfort zone to learn how to do the things you don’t know how to do now.

Network Marketing is not a thing you learn to be great at overnight.  It may take you years.  It took me 17 years before I overcame my own pig-headed limitations enough to ask for help.  I could have done it years earlier, but I must have felt it was important to explore failure from every angle possible.  Some would call this stupidity, I couldn’t agree more.  However, while I was out there failing, I was also learning.  I began making money in the industry when I finally decided to sell out to my dreams.  Yes I learned from the person I asked for help, but frankly, because I was really ready to start winning, all it took from him was a gentle push in the right direction.  It is because of these experiences that I strongly believe Network Marketing is a career, not a company.  Companies come and go.  You can’t let that stigmatize you as you are learning the skills needed to win.

When things are bad you have to work doubly hard to turn them around.  You can’t go home and plop down on the couch and lick your wounds.  You have to work through the slumps like you have never worked before.  When you do, things can turn around fast.  When things are good, you have to really turn it on and get all you can get while you can get it.  When everyone is telling you yes, you’re in the zone.  It is in these moments in the zone that you can define the size of your success.  If your goal is to sponsor 30 people a month, you might think; one a day and I can quit.  But if you ask anyone who has ever sponsored 30 people in a month they will tell you something very different.  They will tell you a story of going days of working hard but never sponsoring anyone.  They will tell you a story of getting one or two a day.  And, they will tell you about moments in the zone when they got 7 or even 10 in one day.  On those days, when the gods of the zone let them in, they simply got all they could get while they could get it.

It is in these moments in the zone that we need to perform like champions.  It is in these moments in the zone that the world stops turning and we do the impossible.  Would you like to experience what it is like to have these magic moments in the zone?  If the answer is “yes, I want some of that” then here is what you will have to do.  Acquire the skills needed to win, use them often and work as if you really want to escape the rat race.  It is in doing the hard work that we find these moments in the zone.  When you get there, go get all you can get while you can get it.  Then work hard again until the next zone arrives.  You will be shocked how often the zone likes to visit those who use it wisely.