“When an entrepreneur takes a risk, jobs are created” – Carly Fiorina, Former HP Boss
The Life of a successful person is mostly based on trial and error – he tries various possibilities, assesses varying outcome, and then sticks to a successful formula. This is the way it works at least for most successful people I come across. In 2007, I experienced a windfall in Network Marketing but many people especially those that believed in me got burnt. There were successful peeps but the numbers were small in ratio to the ones that failed.
When I resigned my job, I told myself that I would do my best not to leave a bitter taste in the mouth of any human being. I realized that I needed to make a lot of adjustments to the way I added value – I dropped Network Marketing and stuck to product sales. It was quite challenging in the beginning with the quality of the products and online distribution but I quickly got it right. I live comfortable on product sales but I realized that this was not the reason for setting up my blog.
I wanted to empower people financially – I wanted to teach people how to fish in whatever venture they found themselves. I looked at unemployed graduates, their immediate need is to get a job so I tried my best to provide info on job vacancies; I looked at the workforce executive, their need for promotion and I tried to make their lives easy by providing low-cost Project Management Class; I looked at start-up entrepreneurs and I am connecting them to accessible cheap funds.
However, I realized that in order to juxtapose these three sets of people (unemployed, executives and start-up entrepreneurs), I needed a workable business model that I may adopt to help them. The only thing I believe will work is Network Marketing. Why? It requires little capital for start-ups, it leverages on helping people rather than helping yourself alone, it creates an avenue to build an asset that will work for you (Plan B for workforce executive), etc. However, I am dragging my feet in adopting this model of business because of past experience but I have seen it help so many people in other countries. There must be something the Network Marketing proponents are missing in Nigeria – I really don’t know what it is but I am hoping to find out.
As long as Nigerians are heavily into “Contribution” to gain lumps of money and “word of mouth” is a prevalent life style; I see Nigeria with its population and life style as a hub for Network Marketing but for some reason, people taste the bile and run 440km/hr. Who is to blame: The leaders: The Business Model: The Packaging: Low Result: Lazy Attitudes: Conscience? In order to truly understand successful Network Marketing model, I decided to avoid asking those who may appear to be successful in it but are undergoing “trial and error” and ask those who have “been there, done that” for more than 15 years. In the coming post, I will interview Robert Butwin – a seasoned multi-millionaire (in dollars not pesos) – about insight on Network Marketing. Have a lovely week!
