Real Networking

When people hear of "networking" they immediately think of network marketing and MLM and then conclude outright it's a scam. But let me show you what real networking is and how everyone needs it--and I mean everyone who wants big-time success.

Networking means building connections and useful relationships. First, you build connections, and this means making yourself available to all, making friends and looking for useful friendships which you build up as regular connections. Then you seek to build this to the next level of building useful relationships you can later use to help others get connected into a network useful to them. 

Humans are created to network. This was what they meant in the 1950s about "no man is an island." This was what the Hebrews writer in the bible meant when he wrote "do not neglect meeting together" stressing the importance of fellowship. This is what the internet and Face Book are all about. This is why we like connecting with people and relatives and long lost classmates and friends on FB. It's all about real networking. And admit it or not, we do it for a later benefit, consciously or unconsciously. 

We don't just connect with people because of connecting per se. Back in our minds we want to connect so we can easily reach them later for some need in the future--like a reunion, a family matter, a query about someone you both know of, a curiosity about the place where they live, a favor to ask, etc. So we keep addresses and telephone numbers and now, we add friends on FB or we Yahoo Mail. That's real networking.

And if you have a business or just want success in whatever endeavor you have, you got to have connections. It enables you to penetrate more into sources of information or power. To have connections you have to make yourself available, approachable, and accessible. That's why it's baloney trying to avoid social networking sites for fear of revealing your identity or being too wary about accepting friends online. This is the era of getting connected and expanding connections. This is the age of real networking. Personal security? The thing is to be wise like a serpent about it.

Filipinos should benefit much from networking. We like making new friends and getting connected. We value relations and easily make and grow them. We often say friends are our riches. The problem is, we fail to really monetize our connections. 

Meet Clarence. He's a real networker. And he's into sales. He keeps in touch with all his friends and relatives and grows his connections. He maintains sincere friendship with them and at the same time helps them get their needed connections. He acts like an operator connecting calls to different departments. If he learns of someone needing to buy some property, Clarence connects him with a realtor he knows. If someone in his network of connections needs to buy a car, he helps connect the need to an answer--and earns some commission from the connections.

Is that bad--earning commissions from your network? The only thing bad is stealing money. If you're an agent who connects buyers with sellers or products, you deserve commissions. It's a legal way of life in sales.

Meet Robert. He easily organizes parties, plays and performances, events, exhibits, and even simple reunions. This is because of his wide network or connections. He can even have interiors renovated fast because he has connections (and close at that) with interior designers, decor people, suppliers, and carpenters and painters.

Meet Roel. He caters to different offices for their different needs--in fact, every need under the sun. If they need carpets, framed pictures, ID pictures, passports, coffee, lunch, or if they need deliveries, he does them all for them--of course for a fee. He easily does this because he has right connections.

That's the power of real networking. The keys to fruitful networking are friendliness, sincerity, and trustworthiness. And then you become jobless big-time.

Righteous Selling

Righteous selling is simply recognizing that it's a buyer's world nowadays. The buyer should call the shots as far as buying is concerned. We don't hardsell anymore--we persuade. And persuade means intellectual negotiations where both seller and buyer end up with a fair deal. It's not anymore the seller giving the buyer a blitz (sustained strategic bombing) and shocking him so that he finds himself buying something he doesn't need.

Righteous selling is making sure the customer got what he really needed, not what you wanted him to buy so you'd hit your quota. We often praise sales people who easily make big sales and hit their targets. As long as sales are coming in we don't mind the effect on the clients. Were they satisfied with their buy? Was the product they got what they really needed? Did their purchase really solve a problem? Or did it just add to it? 

A lot of sales were done due to pressure or subtle forcing or intimidation or mere abuse of relationships. The client pitifully ended up with a product he didn't need or want but which he'd forced himself to buy and consume. I even know people who fooled themselves into believing that they needed the product and bought some more--all because they valued their relationship with the seller. Yes, you may make money in a legit way   like that but you'll be making a lot of unhappy clients. It's not righteous selling, just the same.

Righteous Network Marketing

The same thing is true with network marketing. The best thing is to put people in a business they're genuinely happy and comfortable with. I know of many networkers who happily cheer their rich upline, but that's all they will ever be--a cheering crowd for the one upline on top who's growing rich because of their steady purchases--purchases they make in hopes of someday becoming like the successful upline--to no avail. 

Most uplines like that don't care whether the business is what people really need. All they want are more downlines. Sure enough, that hardselling made them rich, but the height of his career will sooner or later hit a ceiling and plateau till it starts to have a descending trend. Yeah, they'd try to help their downlines some, but how can you help someone who's in the wrong business--who was only forced there through hyped promises, hyped presentations, hyped income potentials, peer pressure, or sheer shock treatments.

Righteous network marketing is supposed to give everyone a chance to earn big--probably not all can become millionaires but at least earn big. And it's done through networking. Networking means building relationships or close links--not building an empire for an emperor whom all the subjects below hail. Real networking is giving equal chances and helping each other succeed--which should be spearheaded by network leaders, but which very, very seldom happens. Networks often degrade into mere empires. And history tells us that no empire ever lasts. 

What lasts are families, which networks should be like. A network is really a clan of networkers with the same marketing DNA helping each other pursue a common goal. I have not seen it done this way. Network leaders just get anyone even without a common marketing DNA denominator. It's all recruitment without relationships. They bombard the poor prospect with hypes and sometimes lies, and once he signs up, the party's over. You realize you've been had.

Downlines' Initiative

Downlines are also at fault. They enter the business without knowing its real nature. They think their sign-up obligates their referrer to do the business for them. They wait for their uplines to make them earn money. Why is this story repeated in network marketing year in and year out? Because they were forced or hyped into joining the business but the whole story was never stressed to them. All they were told were the easy hundreds of thousands or million checks.

Recruitment in network marketing should equal righteous selling.

Growing a Network (2)

You'd probably say the kind of duplication I espouse here is unrealistic. You'd say it can never happen. You cannot keep networkers sticking to a single business and leader through life. They will always look for another. And anyway, it is not growing a network. So, forget about duplication and just focus on recruitment en masse. So it's got to be big meetings to get a steady supply of downlines.

Well, that's how they've been doing networking, and it's not networking--it's pure recruitment. Big meetings are good now and then, but once it becomes the main bread and butter, it's nothing but desperation. It's tantamount to "hiring." And honestly, how many of the recruits really continue in the business? One or two percent or less. The rest stop and feel duped. Yeah, they do the business for a while but only to spend more than they earn, spurred on and hyped only by the uplines who are making it good on the far top. The rest are just used to create an impression of great quantity and for noise. Networking has got to stop being like this. This is not growing a network--it's growing an empire with a lone emperor on top with a few of his cohorts.

From 11 to 25,000 in 5 Years

I was amazed by the phenomenal growth of the communist rebels in the countryside in the 1980s in the Philippines. They started as a ragtag band of 11 young people who looked like they were yet on milk and never tasted wine. They had no office or company support or tools for proliferation. They were constantly in hiding and in grave danger. In 5 years they grew to more than 25,000, a growth of about 5,000 a year. They became a major threat.

How did they do it?

They had only 3 things: Undying idealism, strong belief, and duplication.

Duplication? Oh yes. That was the reason the government could not eradicate the revolution though they kept arresting and liquidating student leaders, labor leaders, and leaders of the armed front. When a leader was eliminated, another one like him replaced him. The military kept announcing the sure demise of the communist insurgency because so and so leader had been captured. It never happened. The movement continued and is alive to this day. They did it one on one, closely proselytizing their recruits and transferring their idealism, ideology, and spirits to them. There was a transfer of ideological DNA and a culture was developed. That's growing a network. Once you do that your growth will be firm and unstoppable.

There's got to be DNA transfer. It's that or nothing. Electoral campaigns can get large crowds of people but after the political meeting and election, it dies. People look for another party gimmick to be able to gather again. And they largely rely on handouts. That's rubbish.

DNA transfer creates a culture and an undying idealism that gets transferred intellectually and settled in the hearts. If the communists were able to do it without enjoying freedom and company support, why can't networkers who get company support and technology aid and all the freedom in the world? They should be growing a network that grows established and which lasts a very long time. The communist movement in the Philippines started in the 1930s (PKP) and continues to this day, taking some form of evolution (CPP), being flexible to changes to adapt to the times. That's growing a network.

We should grow a network, in the real sense of the term. A real network. A real network is founded on real and deep relationships, not just skin-deep, rubbish recruitment. A network is NOT an empire where an emperor reigns supreme. That's slavery. A real network is a fraternity of kindred spirits and intellects, committed to help each other, led by a company of selfless leaders who win by making their junior associates win.