Direct sales opportunity, with the current economic and market situations as they are, is fast gaining ground and popularity as an alternative source of income.  Any direct sales consultant with a home business,  you know that marketing is a fundamental to building any successful direct sales home party business.  Where many a home party plans business owner stumble, struggle and fail is not knowing to whom they are marketing and how to market both online and offline!

You see the common urge in the mlm direct marketing industry is to try and crumb something down the throat of a would be customer.

When you get a potential customer, many will do an immediate sales pitch.  It is unfortunately premature and turns people off! A better method, that any direct sales marketing guru will tell you and a business best practice is the 2 step direct marketing.

Simply put, 2 step direct sales marketing is based on giving something away for free, or at low cost, with the purpose of getting something back in return.  Of course that something is a sale, but beyond that is the relationship.  The idea here is to start small and build.  You want to obliterate concerns before you sell them anything – this is what is termed as pre-selling.

Step 1: Give away something, time, free samples, free demos, a free report, free session of coaching or consulting. 

Step 2: Get their contact information and permission to market to them.  This is called dripping information.  No hard sells please.  In this phase you are building rapport and trust.  Why?  So that you can begin to exert your influence.  Ever heard of the phrase Jump!  How high?  Good, that is the power you will command if your engage in the 2 step process!

So here is the psychology behind it You get a visitor to your site or meet a potential customer/business builder.

What you want to do is get their
1.Attention
2.Permission
3.Interact
4.Trust
5.Influence

You want to craft an irresistible offer, to raise the fever pitch if you will..  In doing so you will get their attention and in effect raise anticipation.
If you place and ad in a paper, mail out a postcard or have a website, the best way to get attention is an irresistible headline.  For example

How To Have “Killer” Sex
At Any Age… Even If
You Don’t Deserve It!

I have a feeling that got your attention and you are headed to google search to figure out if the book exists.  At the time of this writing, I have not yet ascertained the validity nor the existence of the book.

Your attention getting message must be compelling create a compelling giving just enough information about the product to get the prospect to take some sort of action. Invoke curiosity….

Direct Sales Training Tip : Use the useful but incomplete rule…don’t give it all always.  You now what they say, why buy the cow if you can milk it for free?

2. Call to action: There is no point in crafting an irresistible offer only to drop the ball.  People like sheep, must be led every step of the way.

A call  to action is the desired action you would like the potential prospect, client or customer to make.  For example Click Here To Order.  Limitted Time Offer.  While Supplies Last.  Get Your Free Copy Today!

The purpose of the call to action is an exchange of information.  You are capitalizing on their desire to get their hands on what you have in return for their name, phone number, email address and where possible a physical mailing address!  This is called getting people to raise their hand for information.  This is the essence of <a rel=”nofollow” onclick=”javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview(‘/outgoing/article_exit_link’);” href=”http://www.sethgodin.com/permission/”>permission marketing</a>, a term that is associated with Seth Godin, Marketing Demi-god!

Those who raise their hands for information become very hot direct sales leads. These are great business opportunity prospects and an excellent way to build a list.

As every direct sales representative or home party consultant knows, the “fortune is in the follow-up!”  Once the information exchange that was initiated by you is done and you have provided them with the requested information don’t stop there. Now you get into the direct sales marketing relational capital area of things!  You all know of the dismal statistics

“95% OF PEOPLE FAIL WHEN THEY START A BUSINESS WITHOUT A SYSTEM.

95% PERCENT OF PEOPLE ARE SUCCESSFUL WHEN THEY START A BUSINESS WITH A SYSTEM! “
-    Entrepreneur Magazine

This is a direct result of lack of follow up and follow through! 
Contrary to popular opinion, the money is not in the list. If you haven’t heard this before “the money is in the follow-up” so continually follow up. Once you have permission to market to people set up an email marketing campaign! If you don’t have an autoresponder, get one, this is the easiest way to follow up. Send them an email as often as necessary to create a relationship and remind them of your backend product. Don’t just do hard selling here.  I am a strong proponent of direct mail efforts with a combination of email marketing!

2 step direct – marketing  method is a time tested marketing method and will produce targeted prospects for your home based business.  The idea here is work smarter not harder!

Work at home holiday sales will soon by brimming for many home business owners with Christmas and the new year. What better time to end a busy prosperous year and start thinking about an even more prosperous one? That’s right! This is the ideal time to start thinking and planning ahead for all the exciting possibilities for holiday sales, the upcoming year, and the overall growth of your business.

What do you have planned to grow your business?

What can you do to boost your income for the holidays?

What are your plans for your customers?

What are your business goals for the coming year?

Yes, a lot of questions, and ones that are so easy to procrastinate until another day. Well, this is another day. These are things you currently need to carefully consider. Your success essentially depends on your future plans. So, what will you be doing for your business?

Below are some simple tips to think about

* Send out holiday greeting cards graced with your logo. I think it adds more of a personal touch if you add a handwritten message inside your card along with your signature instead of a typed one. Also, always include a business card inside the holiday greeting card.

* Send out a special holiday newsletter to your customer base. Include your best tips along with specific holiday sales. This is the time of year to show your customers you really care by offering generous discounts on special products and/or services.

* Have a holiday contest and offer real prizes to draw in targeted traffic. The contest could entail many things depending on what your business is about. I’ve seen many forum contests that have been successful and they range from various types . Another idea that works well is creative writing contests, these could involve articles, blog posts, poetry, and the like. Perhaps a fun trivia contest would be a hit with your audience.

* If you have products available online, offer free shipping for a limited time throughout the holiday season. This sale booster always gets the interest of online shoppers. Always include your business card along with the shipped product.

* If you own a website and offer advertising space, have a discount sale on a select few of your ad options. Everyone is looking for reasonable advertising around the holidays. Extend the sale into the new year as well. I have found people are looking for new target places to advertise in January.

* Include a freebie with your holiday sales. This could be a gift card, an ebook, or anything you can offer for free that benefits your business.

* If you’re involved with article marketing and are consistently writing for your business, incorporate your articles into an ebook. You can either sell the ebook or offer it as a freebie to your customers.

* Provide extra special customer service! This in itself is the most important aspect of your online presence. This should be practiced all year round. Good customer service is crucial to your business. If you don’t show your customers good service, then you may as well not have a business in the first place.

Here are some suggested business goal tips to consider for the new year

* Make your goals realistic. However, you should set goals that give you the initiative to surpass what you actually think you can easily achieve.

* Put your goals in writing and post them where you can easily see them daily.

* Join at least one new social network in the new year

* Make it a point to stay more in contact with your customers

* Try and incorporate more creativity into your marketing plans

For the new year, I will be spending more time in consistently adding more content to my website and blogs and more time on article marketing.