The Journey of an Entrepreneur
(the story so far)
The Starting Line
My journey to being an entrepreneur began at school. I never felt like I really fitted in: don't get me wrong, I loved learning (still do) but never quite understood why co-sines, tangents and the Pi formula were important to every day life. The first stirrings for the "bigger picture" started then: I never really wanted to follow the herd. I was classed as one of the "A" graders, but limped out of school with only 3 'O' levels (not good for someone who took 9!).
Failing my exams meant that instead of following a path to university (and ultimately law which was my original plan), I went to college instead to take a Diploma in Business and Finance. Finally I could see sense in the stuff I was learning and could see how it could be applied. It was on this Diploma that I started learning about the big subject of Marketing. It's a strange subject to learn and I don't think you ever really get to grips with it until you do it for real.
Again, all through college I had this niggly feeling that I didn't fit it and wanted a different life. But at aged 17 I was too young to know that there was a different life out there. The internet didn't really exist then, no-one had PCs and mobile phones were still the size of bricks and for the wealthy business men and women.
In the Race
I have to get in at this point that my very first job was at Harrods in London! A 9 month foray into retailing - which cemented the fact that I never wanted to be in that industry ever again! I'd left home at 19 to move into a dodgy bedsit in East London. Not a great place but at £180 a month it was all my miniscule salary of £487 a month could stretch to! But I had my very own one person kettle and a small black and white TV so I was happy!
A hope, skip and a jump saw me quickly move into my marketing career. I landed a position as "Sales Promotion and Advertising Assistant" in a large well known “corporate”, based in Knightsbridge. Not a great place to be based if you're on a low salary (beautiful and expensive shops!!). My four years here gave me a really good grounding in all aspects of marketing - a grounding that I shall be thankful for for evermore.
It was whilst working here that I spent a couple of years studying and qualifying in my professional marketing exams.
I finally left to throw myself into the world of advertising and direct marketing agencies, and started worked in some of the top agencies in London. Agencies are where you really learn marketing. The hours are long (I once did 6am through to 2.30am), it's very tiring, it's very unglamorous and it's very hard work. A few years of this and unsurprisingly I got very stressed, and ill from it too.
I rose to the top, running one of the biggest accounts in the UK, but in all honesty I felt a fraud. I loved marketing, but hated the hard sales side I was expected to do as part of my role. I hate petty behaviour, and this world is full of it. People are also out for themselves: I got a knife in my back from one client who lied to save his hide. Not nice.
Eventually I'd had enough. Coming home in tears every night was not good. Leaving home at 5.30am and returning at 7.30pm was not good either. The salary and car were now wonderful - but at what cost?
By now Peter (who I met way back when I was 15!) and I had got married and we had come up to stay with my mum for a weekend. The east wing of the big country house opposite was up for rent. We went in to see it (mainly to be nosey) and then spent the 3 hour car journey back home trying to come with reasons why we shouldn't move.
Talk about a change! Within a few days, we'd arranged to rent the new house, put our house on the market, I'd handed in my notice and arranged to move to the opposite side of the country in January! (This was end October).
Meanwhile I'd been training as an aromatherapist. Not completely out of the blue as aromatherapy and natural health has been an interest of mine since my teens. Once we'd moved, I got a maternity cover position, which then turned into consultancy work, and continued with my studies. I took my exams and passed with flying colours - the first person in the UK to qualify with 100%!!
The Birth of an Entrepreneur
And so, finally, after many years of wanting to work for myself, I took the plunge. I left the lucrative world of marketing to work for myself as an aromatherapist. That was in 2000 and I've never looked back...never wanted to go back to work for someone else. My personal interest and specialism with aromatherapy was in skin care, and in the conditions where the doctors don't know what's wrong and can't treat. I had a very successful practice, and for the first time was using all my marketing skills and knowledge for me - with a budget of about £0! A little different from the £30million I was working with not long before!
Somewhere in there I started working with other complementary therapists, teaching them the marketing skills that I took for granted. And this set me onto a whole new path. Although I couldn't stand working in the marketing industry itself, I loved the actual marketing - and even better, loved being able to teach it to people in a way that they can use too. Marketing is a combined art and science – and used properly can work wonders.
Becoming a Mum (a slight diversion in the entrepreneurial race)
Our son arrived screaming into the world in 2003 and I had so many problems with him crying that I turned to massaging him. I'm a qualified massage therapist, but didn't know the first thing about massaging babies. However it worked, and one thing led to another and I took an additional qualification as an Infant Massage Instructor. Alongside my aromatherapy, I taught groups of mums how to massage their babies. It's such a great thing for a mum (or dad!) to do, and a humbling thing to teach. My goal is to be able to volunteer my instructing to parents of life limited babies and young children in hospices and babies in Special Care Baby Units.
Again using marketing I had an extremely successful baby massage business, running at one point four classes a week. I somehow managed to create a position for myself on the committee of the International Association of Infant Massage for marketing the organisation. Through that I ended up running an unofficial marketing coaching service for other instructors.
Eventually I gave up aromatherapy: my back got too bad to massage people, and I couldn't take my home made skin care products to the commercial market (too much legislation). And sadly I had to put my baby massage classes on hold for a while as I was pregnant again.
Our daughter had a much calmer arrival in the world in 2007 and I took a year out to look after her and be a mum.
The Network Marketing world beckoned...
Whilst I was running my baby massage classes, I was approached to look at an additional income opportunity that would fit in with what I was doing (you know the score!). I've always been open to opportunities so I took a look and joined my first network marketing company: a fairly major player in the industry.
Ambitious from the start, we only wanted to reach the top of the comp plan. So we did everything our sponsors told us. Instead of a 100 name list, we had about 500. We did cold calling, contact marketing, door drops, ads in papers and so on. None of it worked. We worked hard, got some reasonable success, but never made it to the top.
Everything that we were taught to do to "market" out business, grated. We never felt professional, never liked what we were doing, it never felt right, but we did it anyway because that's what we were told you did. But at some point I started to question it. Network marketing is an industry and business model that I love, and makes perfect sense. I love the motivation of it, the fun that you can have, and the lifelong friendships that I've made.
But if it's a serious business model, why on earth is it using unprofessional methods to grow the business? People come into the industry from all walks of life and different skill sets. So I understand that the industry has to teach the "lowest common denominator" of information: the things that everyone can do. But they can't. My first sponsor is BRILLIANT at contact marketing. No-one can hold a candle to her. Me (and most others I speak to) - hate it and would rather crawl under a rock!
What everyone can do though, is learn and implement proper marketing skills. My feeling always was that this industry would be so much easier if you had qualified prospects coming to you, instead of you hunting them down. I didn't want to talk to 100 people to get to the 5 who would join (and then 4 of those to drop out). I only wanted to speak to the interested parties in the first place.
Whilst I was taking my year out with our daughter I started to map out a book on marketing. A book that taught all my marketing skills and knowledge to network marketers. Not the network marketers who want an easy ride. But those who love the industry, see it as a business, and are prepared to do the work necessary to build that business. If I can give people the professional skills and tools, then they can go away and build their businesses. You see, 20 years in marketing means that I know it works, and I know how it works. Businesses all over the world use marketing to bring them in qualified prospects, who turn into customers. Not all prospects turn into customers, but that's fine. The marketing process filters out the people who aren't interested. So why shouldn't this industry benefit from the same knowledge?
And so this site was born. November 2008 sees me launching my first group coaching course on marketing to a group of network marketers. I'm writing more information to go on this site, I have a CD and a book that are in development, with lots more products and services in the pipeline to help struggling network marketers.
The Birth of a Leader
What of my first company? Well I know it's not the "done thing" to swop companies, but I did anyway: I wanted to join a team that supported my marketing endeavours, and fit into my life as a Mumpreneur. With two young children, being out and about is not easy and I wanted something that I could literally do from home (driving all over the county is not being "at home"). My family suffered with me not being here with my first opportunity and I didn't want that to happen again. I enjoyed using the internet and wanted an internet based solution rather than a physical one. I wanted a company where my customers could be responsible for ordering their own product when they saw fit, rather than me having to call them for an order. And I wanted an online registration facility for new distributors, rather than a paper based one. Not much to ask for then!
But I found one. Even better, it spans both consumer and business markets. It's unique and has real value to people. And I can use the product to market itself. Dead easy. We quickly became #1 in the UK. That sounds impressive, but the company is still new in the UK, and relatively new in the US too (only 50,000 distributors worldwide I think). So, no we're not making mega bucks yet, but it does pay for itself. We have a strong, clear vision for this company in the UK, and to help the growth across the world.
My upline advocates nothing but marketing and her team training is nothing like you've ever seen. Excellent, high quality, and constantly updated. I'm proud to be a member of this team. And she'll NEVER tell you to make a 100 name list...cold call...go contact marketing. In fact it's the exact opposite!
I’m still honoured to have learned about this business from my first sponsor and upline. They taught me loads: how to structure a network marketing business; which people to work with and so on. They will always be dear to me, but I had to find a company that I wholly believed in and supported my ethics, values and the way in which I wanted to work.
So...
This is the company that I'm proud to belong to.
If you're interested in chatting to me further about the business opportunity itself then please fill in your details once you've clicked on the link above.
If you're not interested in a new opportunity (either as a complete change, or to run alongside your current network marketing company), BUT you'd be interested in finding out how the product that I work with can boost your current network marketing business two or three fold very easily (as a customer), then:
Read this report and complete your details at the end of it
...and I'll get back to you.
NB Please don't complete your details in either section unless you are serious and really would like me to get in touch: I know you can appreciate how frustrating it is when someone asks you to give them a call about your business, only to disappear off the face of the planet.
Obviously there is no obligation in contacting me, but ultimately I only want to work with serious, professional people both in my team, and as customers.
2009 - A Bright Future Awaits!
My business now falls into two parts: my marketing coaching business where I'll be working just with network marketers across all companies, and building
my own network marketing business.
I am dedicating my marketing experience and knowledge now to the network marketing industry. I am passionate about helping as many people as I can reach success in their business, whether they’re in my team or not.
If you'd like to receive my weekly newsletter - the only professional marketing newsletter written for network marketers on the net (and get updated about my CDs, books and courses) - then just
go here.
My Vision for the Future
That the public at large do not shy away in horror at any mention of the word “MLM” or “Network Marketing”. That we can be seen as hard working, professional individuals all striving for a better future in a very fair and entrepreneurial industry. That the network marketing industry itself is seen as a highly professional one, whether a person wants to join it or not.
And a world where each individual lives life to their full potential, in whatever career or life they choose. And that each person on this planet respects every one else’s way of life.
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