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June 18, 2003
Quixtar and Market Saturation: Part III
By QBlog in
I'm not a professional saleman. However, this should not preclude me from making some basic, common sense observations about sales and selling.
No matter what anyone says, the way to make money in Quixtar is selling. Selling products, tools and IBOs. I realize that nobody is actually selling IBOs but the skills and tactics used to recruit IBOs essentially amounts to sales. When you get a new (active) IBO in your organization then you've essentially made a "sale."
Think of it this way, if you don't ever get any IBOs under you, then you won't make any money. No matter how hard you work, no matter how much you invest, you are not going to make money unless you sign up an IBO. That is sales. If you don't seal the deal then you don't get paid.
The Issue
Look at any traditional sales business. They work very hard to ensure that two salesmen are not competing for the same business. By developing sales regions, creating product categories, distributing client lists, etc. these business seek to avoid what is essentially market saturation. Say Company A sells widgets and has a sales staff of 5. Now imagine all 5 competing to sign a contract with Mr. S. While they are toiling away to impress Mr. S (and beating each other over the head), Company B signs contracts with Mr. P, Mrs. Q and Mr. K without any competition from Company A. Not good.
Now there may be some exceptions to this (Jerry McGuire?) but most businesses want to distribute their resources (salesmen) to get the most bang for their buck. They work very hard by studying the market, understanding trends and avoiding duplication. However, Quixtar has no such mechanism in place to similarly optimize the efforts of its sales force (IBOs).
And this is one of my biggest complaints. I have no way of knowing what type of sales environment I'm getting into. It may be great. It may suck. But Quixtar doesn't know (or do they?), I don't know and my upline doesn't know. Maybe it will take me 5 times as much effort and resources as my upline to achieve the same success. Maybe it will take half as much effort. Who knows. The point is that somebody should know. Someone should be able to at least understand that too many IBOs are competing for the same recruits here, while not enough are working over there. Without this knowledge it's left up to the individual IBO to figure it out and quite often the effort and resources spent to gain this knowledge take such a toll, that IBO resigns in despair and ridicule believing he's a failure.
-- End of Series on Saturation --
Many new MLMs are started with kingping positioning themselves and their cronies and downlines at the top of the pyramid. Positioning is everything. The guys at the bottom are always the serfs to the guys at the top and for the reasons you stated above it is extremely hard to go anywhere with MLMs and harder for the guys underneath you. Even if you do achieve any degree of success, see how hard it is to maintain it. Plus, the guys at the top can change the game at any time it suits them. Unless you are truly at the top its a sucker's game.
Posted by: Richard Boyd | June 30, 2006 2:59 AM