Have you ever wondered what it takes to move a referral marketing or direct selling company into viral growth?

We’ve all heard ideas like the KISS method(keep it simple stupid) or seen demos of how technology can make all your dreams come true when running a direct selling venture. But if you zoom out to a high-level strategy, what are the actual building blocks of virally growing a direct sales company?

A Simple Story

Simplicity is important.

Do people understand your story?

Is it clear why your product or service exists and the problems your product or service solves?

Does it take a full 30-minute presentation to understand your story or can someone “get it” in a 2-3 minute video?

Are there so many options to participate in your company that each customer needs a personal 1-hour zoom webinar to even know which option is right for them?

When we ask the above questions, it is evident that simplicity is key. Time and again we see simple stories many times with only one path to be a retail customer to experience the product or service gaining massive viral growth in the space.

For example, if every time a new customer goes to your website to enroll, they get confused on your shopping cart and need to call the marketer that invited them to the site for advice on ‘which’ offering to start with, you are losing.

One of the best tips I’ve heard on ‘keeping it simple’ is to gather 5-10 people one-on-one and simply watch them navigate your website and shopping experience on their phone or computer and see if they have questions, see where they get stuck, as these moments are clues on how to optimize your offers.

Just like the millions of products and services we all buy every day without needing to talk to another human, skip the temptation to overcomplicate your offer.

Here is a sample of how the team at Naxum.com chooses to tell the story behind why they exist in less than 1 minute:

Create a Compliant Selling System

If your systems work, your teams will use them.

Parts of the referral marketing industry from direct selling to multi-level marketing have created a marred past with regulatory agencies from the tendency of marketers to ‘stretch the truth’ or outright lie about the benefits of products to get sales.

When you look deeper and many of the products or services where promoters are stuck in compliance issues, the root cause can be found as a failure of the leadership. The corporate team has failed to provide a compliant selling system…that actually gets sales in the marketplace.

Let’s be clear. It’s not enough to just provide a compliant selling system. The system, when used by your newest marketers, must actually get a positive result. Companies with compliance issues many times are blinded to the fact that it’s not enough to just have a system. The company is responsible for testing, optimizing, and continually making sure the systems are so relevant and persuasive that they actually get real sales.

Gamify Daily Habits

The simple actions, repeated over time, compound into a movement.

Now that your team has identified the simple daily actions needed to grow the business, it is time to gamify the habits.

Platforms called ‘predictive action engines’ act as a coach or top leader, sitting next to the newest member on your team, ‘suggesting’ what they should do next.

In the predictive systems, your team member commits to daily habits, and on their mobile app laser focus on ‘winning the day’:

Goals for the day are traditionally around the number of new people to reach out to, the number of people to follow up with, minutes spent watching training videos, and the amount of shares on social media accounts.

The predictive systems not only act as a 24/7 coach to your members but also expose insights into the data of the real behaviors your team members actually engage in. The behavioral insights allow the company to make decisions on the kinds of content to invest in and data on the behaviors that are actually driving real sales.

To explore a predictive action platform yourself, register here for a discovery session

About Ben

Ben Dixon loves referral marketing. His family found direct sales back in 2006 and had success using technology to create home-based businesses. Since 2010, Ben has focused on serving referral marketing, party plan, mlm, and direct sales companies across the globe with the technology they require to empower their passionate fans to virally grow their businesses.

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