(Please enjoy this post from my good friend and mentor Ferny Ceballos)

This past week, I had a wonderful conversation with a top earner in a fast growing network marketing company, named Laura.

Laura is actually part of a small elite group of top producers, who recently started working with Elite Marketing Pro to help take their business building efforts online and supplement the incredible success they’ve had offline.

As I asked her questions about her background and on how she built her downline organization—including her building philosophy, the type of people she recruits, how she trains new people as they come in, the timing of promotions she runs, etc., and to my surprise, I found myself silently nodding my head ‘yes’ to everything she was doing in her business.

Could you believe it?

A pure ONLINE recruiting advocate, such as myself, was excited and in total agreement with how a top income earner in network marketing built her business OFFLINE!

In fact, many of the things I hated about traditional business building in network marketing, she didn’t like either!

I had found my offline soul-mate. 🙂

She didn’t believe in making a list of 100 closest friends and family for the purposes of pitching an opportunity to.

She didn’t like being out at dinner with her family and feeling compelled to prospect the waiter or anyone else for that matter.

As she said, “If I’m out with my family, I want my full attention to be on my family.”

What prompted this conversation was that she had read a post online by a network marketing trainer that was titled, “Everyone IS your Prospect.”

I think she almost threw up a little in her mouth when she saw that. J/K! 😉

She adamantly & angrily said, “Everyone is NOT Your Prospect! I’m sorry, but being someone with a pulse whom I don’t know is not qualification enough.”

I was like, “Right on… you’re preaching to the choir here!”

Understanding exactly what she was thinking, I then followed up with…

“That is Why Top Recruiters are Almost NEVER the Top Earners”

She responded, “Exactly!”

We were so telepathically in tune, to some reading this right now, this conversation might not make total sense for a few reasons.

First, it’s safe to say that we had just broken commandments #1 and #2 of the ‘old school’ bible.

Make a list of 100 of your closest friends and family
Prospect everyone that comes within 3-feet of you (i.e. the 3 foot rule)

And in fact, I’m so contrarian with this regard, my family has NO IDEA what my business entails, what opportunity I’m involved with or what products I sell.

As far as they are concerned, I’m probably still in Amway, I’m making millions and thankfully don’t bother them anymore.

(FYI I’m not in Amway, but I do run a 7-figure business yet I don’t have to pitch it to a single person I know.)

However, the more nuanced part of the conversation above might have to do with the connection between “Everyone is NOT Your Prospect” and “Top Recruiters are Almost Never the Top Earners”…

You see, it has been my experience that the biggest earners in the network marketing space were NOT necessarily the top recruiters of the company, because a legitimate company doesn’t pay you to recruit people.

They pay you to produce volume (i.e. product sales) and teach others to do the same.

So what a TOP EARNER in a company has figured out is that they need to grow a big organization IN DEPTH, NOT just in WIDTH… and those reps in depth need to produce volume (i.e. be quality leaders).

The true secret to building a stable 6- and 7-figure business in network marketing (or any other business for that matter) is actually to have greater emphasis on QUALITY over QUANTITY.

How to Make 7-Figures By Recruiting FEWER People

A friend of mine, Lisa, who’s spoken at my events and earns 7-figures in her network marketing business, once told me she only sponsored 17 people into her current opportunity, yet has an international organization of thousands which stretches across, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

And my client, Laura, who I was having the conversation with, built a fast growing multiple 6-figure business in less than 2 years having only sponsored 15 people into her personal business.

TOP RECRUITERS on the other hand are SOO GOOD at recruiting people,

a) they spend the majority of their time recruiting, because that’s what they are good at,
b) most people they sponsor are not cut out to be sponsoring ‘monsters’ so there’s no duplication, therefore no depth is created, and
c) there is usually little emphasis on product volume, because there is so much emphasis on recruiting.

The big one here is b), because let’s face it — most people suck at being entrepreneurs and no matter how much you try to motivate, train or love on them, 90% of people won’t ever do crap in their business.

Now, can top recruiters also be top earners? Sure but you’ll find that top earners tend to focus more on training & building leaders.

That’s the reason why Laura didn’t bother making the big list of 100 to pitch her opportunity to or recruit everyone she meets, because she knows the majority of them won’t make good builders!

So here’s what she does instead — she’s very selective, qualifies people rather than recruits them and if she TRULY believes they are winners in life, she will invite them to look at her business.

Otherwise, most people can and will make great customers! In fact, she actually does make a list of 100, but the majority is for customers and very few qualify to be business builders, unless they go through a qualification process.

And frankly, that’s how I promote as well, except instead of doing 1-on-1 conversations to qualify folks, my qualification process is actually automated online using something called ‘attraction marketing.’

How To Automatically Get a Steady Stream of HIGHLY Qualified ‘Entrepreneur Minded’ Prospects

Now before I explain how this works, I just want to share with you what ‘attraction marketing’ is NOT!

Attraction marketing is not spamming people on social media with private messages and posting your sign up link on people’s News Feed. I really hate that crap and if you’re currently doing that, please STOP!

I can’t tell you how many folks in network marketing think they are doing ‘attraction marketing’ or Internet marketing, by sending dozens or hundreds of private messages to strangers per day.

No!

In fact, ‘attraction marketing’ is a completely passive activity (i.e. you aren’t messaging anyone) where people actually send YOU their contact information, so they can learn more about your product or opportunity.

In some cases, it’s your opportunity and in other cases, it’s a product.

But here’s the deal, just because someone shows an interest in your business, doesn’t mean you’re going to sponsor them or want to sponsor them. It means that they need to demonstrate that they are a good fit your business and this is done using something we call in the online world a ‘funnel.’

A ‘funnel’ consists of a series of short steps, which is designed to replace the 1-on-1 interaction my client, Laura, would normally have with a prospect to qualify them.

The problem with doing it offline is that, if you are ‘qualifying’ people, you better be a person who can command a certain level of respect.

If you are my client, Laura, who is confident, well spoken and successful in life, you’re off to a great start and will likely have good success.

But…

If You are Broke, Shy & Scared… You’re Pretty Much Screwed Building Offline

Online, it’s a whole different situation because when a prospect requests information from you about a product or opportunity, you already have posture. They came to you and have already told you they are interested in what you have.

Heck, they are probably super impressed by the fact that they found you online and probably want to know how you did it too!

I generate hundreds of prospects every day for my business, yet only a fraction of them qualify to be leaders in my business.