Hey, hey, what's going on, everyone? This is Steve Larsen, and you're listening to another episode of Secret MLM Hacks Radio. Here's the real mystery. How do real MLMers like us who didn't cheat and only bug family members and friends, who want to grow a profitable home business, how do we recruit A players into our downlines and create extra incomes yet still have plenty of time for the rest of our lives? That's the blaring question, and this podcast will give you the answer. My name is Steve Larsen, and welcome to Secret MLM Hacks Radio.

 

Hey, guys, this is a bit of a different episode. What I did is I went out and I found a guy who is a honestly spectacular individual. He is rare, meaning, he's gone out and he has made seven figures in traditional business, and then he made another seven figures inside of MLM. What's kind of cool is he's going to go through and teach. I asked him to come on this podcast and teach some of the strategies that he's been using. Does that make sense?

 

So he's going to go through and he's going to show, number one, some of the strategies that he's been using inside of MLM to grow a downline that honestly it's run like an actual business. He doesn't recruit people personally anymore. All he does is teach his other people how to do that. Does that make sense? He has embraced this idea of duplication. He's embraced this idea of recruiting people the right way without ...

 

Let's say you are talking to family members and friends. How do you do it in a respectful way? So he's going to go through some of those things with you as well as one of the most powerful recruiting strategies I've ever heard. So anyway, kind of sit back. Relax a little bit with this. It is a little bit of a longer episode, but I think this interview is going to be powerful, and I think it'll be ... This is technically the first interview of this podcast, and I plan to do a whole bunch more. I have in my other show, but, anyway, this'll be a good one, and excited for him. His name is Jon Penkert, and he has actually pulled in through his downline over half a billion in revenue, and he's done this kind of stuff several times.

 

He knows what he's talking about. So anyways, very, very honored to have him on the show, and let's dive right in. We have a very unique opportunity to hear from honestly one of the most brilliant people I've ever met. I actually only met him probably only a month or two ago, but right off the bat I could tell something was different. I have on the call with me Mr. Jon Penkert, who alone inside of the MLM industry, he's one of the top income earners. He's one of those rare guys that has done both seven figures in regular business but also seven figures in the network marketing business.

 

One of the things he's taught me is that most people only recruit two and a half, one, two to three people into their MLM business ever, and to say that he's done, which is true, over 500 million in his own downline is absolutely amazing. So anyway, I'm excited to have Mr. Jon Penkert here with me. How are you doing, man?

 

Hey. Good morning, Steven. Thanks for having me on the call. It's a privilege to be speaking with you.

 

I'm really excited that you're here. This is a very unique take. Most of the time when you hear the word "MLM," I'm sure you were the exact same, you kind of tend to run the other way. Most people do, anyway, and I know that you've have figured out, though, the way that this whole thing works. But before we jump into that, I actually wanted to ask, how did you get into MLM?

 

I was an entrepreneur out of college and moved to Southern California. I wanted to take advantage of the business opportunities there and leverage my skills and my degree. When I arrived, in California, it's kind of the mecca for network marketing. I never really heard of MLM, and so a friend of mine invited me to a meeting, and I was very skeptical. It just seemed too good to be true.

 

Sure.

 

I couldn't believe all the money they were making, and so I was like, "Man, I got to check this out. And it's funny. You say that people run from MLM. What happened is I started getting involved in network marketing, and then people started running from me.

 

Exactly.

 

So I learned very quickly that this MLM business, it's rife with problems, and you end up losing a lot of your friends in the beginning because you don't understand what's required to be successful. You don't understand the key ingredients to network marketing that make successful champions are no different than any other facet of life, whether it's business or music or sports. There's a formula to success, and once you figure that out and you embrace the formula, then guess what? You begin to have the success that you long for.

 

Did you know what that formula was when you first started?

 

No. As a matter of fact, I have about 10 years of pain, which means failure. I learned that success is built on the back of failure, and I certainly, I used to tell people, "I'm the biggest loser in network marketing because I tried everything and did it wrong." So I got about 10 years of pain before I figured out, you know what, there's got to be a smarter way to do this.

 

That's amazing. So when you first joined, though, I guess, what happened? Where was all that kind of failure? Most people don't talk about the failure parts, but I think we can all relate to it.

 

Well, I don't fail small; I fail big. I joined a company. Back in the '80s people in California were making $30,000 a month in network marketing, and there was a company called Fund America. You can research it. It actually is the case ... all the case law studies. It changed the industry because back then, you paid a lot of money for your membership fees. It was high membership fee to get involved in these clubs, these MLM clubs.

 

And the federal government shut them down for illegal Ponzi scheme, and so the big boys like Herbal Life and Amway, they all went to school on that, and they changed how they come to a market. So all the case law for network marketing was really centered around that Fund America. You can do the research on the lawsuit. It turned out they came out on the other side nine months later innocent and not being convicted of a Ponzi scheme because it wasn't, but it ruined the business opportunity, and all the downline had dissipated.

 

So all of us had got involved and began to build saw the rug literally pulled out from under us and what we thought was the biggest opportunity of our life, and we're all going to become millionaires, and the truth is you realize, you know what, if you don't have experienced leaders that have set a foundation to do it right, you're going to get taken out, and there's a lot of examples of that today, but the case law began with that Fund America opportunity that I was knee-deep in and got the rug pulled out from under me.

 

So you came in while that was all going on, then?

 

Yeah. Actually I had the misfortune of coming in at the end. I got all my guys in, and we started running right as they closed the doors.

 

Oh, man. Oh my gosh. So did you pick up and go obviously to somewhere else, then, I'm sure?

 

Yeah. Then I got into a couple other companies. I tried to travel industry is big in network marketing, and I tried supplements. That's also big in network marketing. The number one product in network marketing is weight loss. We live in a culture that suffers from obesity. And everybody wants the quick fix. So there's a formula to losing weight, but everybody wants to take a pill, often times in network marketing companies begin with weight loss. It's very common.

 

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