Hey, hey what's going on everyone, this is Steve Larsen and you're listening to Secret MLM Hacks Radio.
So 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.
Alright you guys, I've got something special to share with you today. Back when I was in college, when I first started learning about how to drive internet traffic and I started learning more about how to actually market online, there was a book I came across that had quite an impact on me. At the time, I was doing a lot of side businesses with buddies. We were going around trying to do real estate deals. We were, ... I was driving traffic for Paul Mitchell, like the big hair company. We'd build websites for the rising companies and their rising celebrities before they went on TV and stuff like that. We were all over the place doing tons of stuff. It was a lot of fun.
There was a specific book that I read, that really helped me understand more of what I need to be doing inside the person's brain, as they experienced what I was building. So think about this with your MLM, think about this with the things that you are out and you're creating. Think about what it is that you can start to apply here. This is a huge lesson, alright?
The book is launched. It's a book by Jeff Walker and what he does, is he teaches you how to create what we call a launch sequence and basically a product launch funnel. Lets say that you've never launched officially, the product you're selling. Lets say you've never actually created an event around the thing you're selling, how do you actually do that, right? I just talked about how you need to create events around what it is you do. Well, how do you actually do that, right? So the book launch is fantastic. I recommend it to pretty much everybody, whoever wants to make money online. And especially if you're inside the MLM space, because it's not a normal style book that I think most stereotypically, the MLMer will go through.
There were nine things that I realized that I needed before I was going to be successful inside my MLM. But what was funny is that none of them were tangible. These are all intangible things. Which to be honest, completely shocked me. I thought that it'd be some, hey, here's the nine steps, here's the nine things. That's not at all how this works. It works instead, ... think of it kind of an emotional state checklist. Lets make sure that we hit each one of these points inside the person's brain. These are the things that gets someone moving. I've already mentioned before, and we all know, humans are lazy by nature, I mean we just are. We always choose the path of least resistance, which is not a bad thing. Some people say that as a negative thing, but it means we go create better processes. "Hey, I don't want to walk 500 miles, lets invent a car." Not that that's how it happened, but you know what I mean, it's not a bad thing that we go for the path of least resistance.
However, a lot of times when it comes to our MLMs and the offers that we have, it can be a bad thing. If we don't put the other person in a certain state of mind, they're not going to do anything with your MLM. They're not going to do anything with your offer, they're not going to join you. They're not going to care at all about you because they will look at you as being selfish. Does that make sense?
When I was driving traffic for Paul Mitchell, that's when I started realizing. I can drive a crap ton of traffic. We drive traffic all over the place. I remember my record so far, is 53,400 visits in two days to a single website. And I was like holy crap, we can drive traffic. But I wasn't doing, ... I'm going to go through this list in just a second, there's nine of them, nine mental triggers, but I wasn't doing these triggers. Because I wasn't doing these triggers, it comes off as if I'm barking. It comes off as if I'm annoying, as if I'm loud, as if I'm running into somebody at the mall. Just like a standard cliché thing for MLMers to do. If you don't want to come across like this, or come across like you're barking or you're begging, or you're yelling, or you're saying, "Come over here, come with me." If you don't want to compete solely on price, this is how you do it. And these are nine things that you can do inside someone's brain to help them want to take action. Does that make sense?
Here they are, these are the nine. Number one, you've got to have some likability, meaning, are you likable? Does the other person like you? Now this list might sound a little bit shocking to you, but notice I didn't say, "Hey, tell them why you're cheaper than the other guy." Does that make sense? Do they like you? So number one, and some of these things are really easy to do and some of them are a little bit, harder to do. So number one, likability.
Number two, reciprocity. How do I get someone to feel reciprocity in their brain? How do I do it? Well, I give them something for free, which is exactly how I vet people on the internet. When people join my downline, I give them these systems that go out and say, hey lets get you, ... giving out this free stuff. If you don't have free stuff don't worry, I've got stuff for you. What it does is create these feelings of reciprocity, somebody wants to reciprocate. If someone shows up at your door on holidays and they've got something for you, lets say it's a neighbor, and lets say they bring you a plate of cookies. I remember distinctly, my mom, my wife, even my myself now, if someone says, hey, we've brought you this stuff. There's this immediate feeling, ... I'm always like, hey just wait a second, and I run back into the kitchen to see if I have something for them. You're trying to create that feeling of reciprocity. If you do that before ever asking for the sale, it's a lot easier.
So number one, likability. If you're just obviously a straight up jerk, obviously, it's hard to be likable. If you are what we call an attractive character, that doesn't mean visually, but are you someone that's nice to be around? You can create likability inside the person's brain. Number two, reciprocity. Are you creating reciprocity inside their head?
Number three, authority. Now authority is interesting. We trust figures of authority all the time. Lets say I'm driving down the street and I run a stop sign, I only need to barely glimpse the colors red and blue flashing lights in my rear view mirror to know that an authority figure is pulling me over. Does that make sense? So the question is to ask is, what are the authority figures? What's the feelings of authority, not that you're trying to be dominate or domineering, or use these powers I'm about to show you for evil. But what you are doing is, you're saying, hey, how can I come at a place of authority to show that I've actually done what I'm talking about. So if you can create feelings of authority.
Number four is trust. Now trust, ...a lot of these all happen and they're a little bit intertwined all through out. Someone can be in a place of authority but you can totally not trust them. I'm not going to get into this at all, but sure sometimes leaders that we've voted for or didn't vote for, those can have those feelings, where they're in a position of authority but maybe you don't trust them. There are different things. How do you develop trust? One of the easiest way to do it is to help the other person solve one of their problems before you ask them to help solve your own. What's the problem you're trying to solve? Well I want to join, I'm going to get this big downline. I want to get people in, I want to get people enjoying what I'm doing. If you present your problem before you help solve their problem, no one's going to care about you. You have to lead with the value and trust comes really easy.
Number five is social proof. Social proof is an interesting one. Here's an example. And actually Jeff Walker, I can't remember if it's in the book launch or not, but he gives this example and he says, hey, have you ever gotten off of an airplane and as you're getting off of an airplane, you kind of just follow the crowd in front of you, when suddenly everyone is turning around and walking the complete opposite direction? You weren't looking for baggage claim, you're just following the crowd. That's a perfect example of social proof, where you don't ask questions, you are just assuming because everyone else, the masses, are going a certain direction, so you are too. If you can create the feeling of social proof inside of someone else's head, that also obviously is going to give, ... that's a mental trigger. That's a huge mental trigger. Obviously you could use each one of these in good ways and bad ways.
Here's the sixth one, scarcity. This is very real. I don't let just anybody join my downline. "What? Steven, oh my gosh, I thought you wanted everyone to join your downline. Oh my gosh!" That's not the case at all. I don't want everyone to join my downline. That was one of the biggest realizations I ever had. If someone needs to join, ... if I'm looking across the street and somebody's is like, that guy needs to join my downline. Look at the situation they're in, look at the financial situation, they need to join. If they need to join, I don't want them in my downline. That's not why I'm getting these people in. Does that make sense?
Scarcity is a big, big deal. So, I make people apply to join my downline. I really do. And I will say no to people. You may not be a good fit, or why don't you turn around and go learn x, y, and z first. I'm not in the business of taking on another project. And I can't have a person be a project. Does that make sense? Sounds totally harsh, but will change your entire business. So scarcity, it's a scarce thing to join my downline. Obviously I would love the masses. I would love this, I would love that, but my team leaders, the people that, ... but seriously, it is an application style business for me. When I flip that on its head, and there's actually an application form which I've been building it, maybe I'll tell you guys about it on another episode. There's actually an application someone goes through that I created on my own, that is not provided by my MLM. I made it, in order to join my downline. Does that make sense?
I want to vet them. I want to know why they want to be in it. I'm not exposing my link all over the place. I actually make my link scarce. Does that make sense? And what's funny is that when we have feelings of scarcity, when we think something is going to run out, we want it more. Does that make sense? So I'll talk more about that probably in another episode, because it's cool strategy that I use for that, and it has to do with how I auto-close people, with some systems online.
Number seven is anticipation. One of the easiest ways to create anticipation is by events. That could be a physical event, it could be a viral event, it could be something online, it could be something you're just talking about. Car dealerships use any excuse to throw events. There are events all over the place. But anticipation, you can always be talking about what's about to happen, the future. Those kinds of things help you a lot, build feelings of anticipation.
I don't know if you've heard of the book, "The 4-Hour Workweek". It's one of my favorite books. In there, the way that he got that book out to market was fascinating. He did not just write a book and release it. He spent a year just releasing a chapter or two here, a chapter or two there, waits a lot of months, come back, and all he was doing is getting on interviews, getting on shows, talking about it, talking about it, talking about it, getting all over the place. Do you see what I'm saying? And he built anticipation prior to the launch. How can you do that in your MLM? How? If you're always available, there's no anticipation. Or if there's never an event, there's no anticipation. Throw some kind of event, something.
Number eight here, is community. Community is obviously very related with social proof. If I have the feelings that when I'm joining, I'm actually joining a legitimate community, that's power my friends. That's such power. Because now, the community becomes their support system. I remember the first time I launched one of my, ... I launched an info product a while ago. I realized that I was the only support. I realized there was no community and I realized that I had done it wrong. When I switched that, and instead built a community around the product, man, it's so much easier. I didn't have to be there all the time. People didn't need that much handholding. It really freed me up. That's one of the keys of duplication.
And then number nine, is actually back to events and rituals. Events, I already talked about, but rituals, rituals is actually the part that is, ... this is such a big deal. When I was in the army, I was in Basic Training, what would we do every single morning? Wake up immediately, you shave as fast as you can, put your uniform on, run outside, and start doing pushups. That was a ritualistic thing, every single day. There were things that we would do over and over and over again. What's funny is that it would put us in state, whatever state they wanted us to be in. It was total state control. They would use that ritual and help us maintain the ritual to maintain the state of a soldier. Does that make sense? It's the exact same thing for your downline.
There are rituals I have my people go through. There are rituals I have my downline go through. I need to have that. I need them to go through certain rituals. What are the daily rituals? What are the weekly rituals? What are the monthly rituals? What are the yearly rituals? What are the things that my community does, my downline, my company? If it's my company, I'm not just grabbing a franchise. I am, but I'm turning into a company. What are the things that my company does on a regular basis, routinely, that everyone can focus on, everyone can anchor into, and have support with? Those rituals will save your butt, especially after someone joins your downline. They've got to know what to do immediately. You have got to have a set of rituals ready for them, and help them, and get them indoctrinated into them. Does that make sense?
Usually I do more like story-based, stuff like that. I hope this was a helpful episode.
These are the nine mental triggers. These are the things that get people to move. And it's not that you have to hit all nine. Think through the ones that you want to hit most. I don't want to say easily, but which ones are going to be the most effective and just start implementing them into your business slowly, and prove it, and then go to the next one, and then go to the next one, and next one. Prove that that one works.
So number one, likability. Number two, reciprocity. Number three is authority. Four is trust. Five is social proof. Six is scarcity. Seven is anticipation. That's one of my favorite ones, personally. Eight is community, and nine is events and rituals.
Alright guys, hopefully it's helpful. I have every one of those nine things planned out throughout my entire business, not just through onboarding somebody but what happens afterwards. And those are all things that repeat, but I need to maintain feelings of likability. Obviously if they hate my guts, that's not a mental trigger, they're not going to do anything. So anyways, ever single one of these, figure out ways to start incorporating them. How can you pull those emotions out of the other person. When you do that, my friends, that is when you start doing closing scripts. That is when you start handing them application forms because they are in a state to receive you, otherwise you might be hitting them some other state and it may be sort of awkward.
Anyways guys, hope it's helpful. I'll talk to you later. Bye.
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