The 5 Core Qualities of Network Marketing Leaders

The inspiration for this blog post came from a training I recently attended with one of my mentors Peter Wolfing, CEO of National Wealth Centre, in which he talked about the 20 Qualities of Network Marketing Leaders. I found the training so inspirational I decided to share the key points I took away from the training in this blog post. Peter is qualified to offer advise on the top qualities or traits of network marketing leaders because he is a very successful network marketer himself, having been in the industry for more than 20 years and in that time he has just about done everything you can think of in the industry.

He has suffered the highs and the lows of network marketing and come out the other side smelling of success. He has himself made a lot of money and spent time in the company of many others who have also made millions of dollars in the industry, including company owners and people that have come up through the ranks, just like himself. In this training Peter shares some of the things that these people have in common and in this abridged version I share what he calls the 5 core qualities of network marketing leaders.

1. Hard Work

Network marketing is hard work, period. You have to put in the time and effort. Many people have a misconception of the amount of work required to succeed with network marketing. If you think that all you have to do is join something, throw out a few posts on Facebook and Twitter and maybe an email or two, and magically people will rush to join your business, then you are in for a rude awakening. It just does not work like that.

This is a real business and you have to put in the hard work to make it happen, just as you would do in a conventional business.

2. Focus

This is very important. Speaking of society in general, there was a time when there were only a few radio and TV channels. Today there is proliferation of apps, social media, multiple TV and radio channels, and other distractions that make it very easy to lose focus.

Similarly, in network marketing, there used to be only a few big companies to chose from and once or twice a year you might find out about something else. Today, there is a new company launched almost every day, each claiming to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, and it can be very difficult to stay focussed on your opportunity.

So, one of the qualities of those leaders that have risen to the top in this industry is the ability to say no. They quickly learnt that you have to pick something from all the different programs that are available, stick with it and focus on what you have to do to make a success of it.

3. Belief

You have to believe in yourself and your ability do it, and you have to believe that the company you picked has your interests and the interest of your business at heart. You need to believe in your sponsor, your upline, your team or group that you are working with and you have to use and belief in the products.

You must have these multiple legs of belief because, if you don’t have belief in one or two of these, then your success will be limited. The most important of these is belief in yourself and a lot of what you do stems from these beliefs. As such, they act as reference points that feed your confidence and your posture, which helps you to maintain a steady ship.

4. Patience

Top network marketers have the patience of a saint. In today’s modern world where everyone wants instant gratification, people have very little patience. In a lot of cases they have unrealistic expectations and when they don’t get the instant results they are expecting, they quit and go off to find something else.

One of the reasons for this is that, generally speaking, network marketing is easy come and easy go, or perhaps it is more accurate to say, easy in and easy out. It is very easy to join a network marketing opportunity because of the low cost joining fees, which can be as little as $10 to $20. This makes it a lot less painful to quit compared with a traditional business business, which can cost as much as $50,000 to $100,000 to join, making it much more painful to quit. So you find that a lot of people will shrug their shoulders and quit a network marketing opportunity after only 30 to 90 days when they don’t see the instantaneous results that they are expecting.

So, in addition to hard work, focus and belief, you have to have patience because nothing comes easy and it doesn’t happen over night.

5 Embrace Change

Finally, you have to embrace change. Most people do not like change because it rocks the boat and often takes people out of their comfort zone. But as a leader you have to embrace change. You have to go with the flow and not offer too much resistance to the change that is inevitable.

There is a saying that goes something like “the only thing that is permanent in this world is change,” and embracing change means understanding that nothing is permanent in this world and sometimes things have to change. For example, sometimes the company has to change to make the improvements that will be to the benefit of everyone.

The same applies to what ever you are doing. You may have to modify whatever you are doing to make progress towards your goals. Doing the same things over and over again leads to stagnation and eventually your business will end up going backwards.