Last Updated on January 26, 2024 by Matt Zavadil

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You know that MLM recruiting is essential to your success.

Without a steady stream of new prospects, your MLM business will eventually die out.

While I have many tips to offer you below, let’s start with probably the most important one of all when it comes to becoming a network marketing recruiting machine

You will meet frustration and disappointment if you get serious about building a strong network marketing business

Every top earner you model your success path after went through it. 

Many years ago, I started in my first MLM company at 19 years old… I remember

  • Calling my warm contact list (no Internet back then…I’m gettin’ old LOL)
  • My hands sweating and my voice shaking on those first calls
  • Feeling disappointed when things didn’t work out the way my upline told me they would

People kept telling me some version of: “Nope, not interested”. 

Over time, I developed a thick skin and “rejection” doesn’t bother me anymore. 

It will take time & experience for you to reach that point…

…but I wanted to bring this up as you work to become better with MLM recruiting. 

Make a mental commitment to never quit because you feel frustrated. It’s the “rite of passage” to making your dreams come true. 

Related Bible Verse: Numbers 6:24 The Lord bless thee and keep thee.

Commentary: Translated from the Hebrew text, "bless" in this passage means to transfer prosperity in the sense of the financial, material, and physical. 

The word "keep" is correctly translated to mean "guard," as in guarding us from straying from the Word after prosperity & abundance become potentially dangerous distractions.

Lesson: Pray to God for help with your business and finances. He will answer. Once blessed, remember the Source of your financial abundance and keep walking with Him.

OK! Ready now to learn some tips that will help you become the MLM recruiting machine I know you want to be? 

Feature Download (if you’re a struggling MLM rep):

I’ve put together a free “MLM Quick-Start Video Guide” that shows you How To Attract 3-7 New MLM Customers & Team Members Per Week Without Prospecting A Single Person.

In it, I show you how to intimately know the pains & goals of your prospects so that you attract the BEST leads for your business.

You’ll never have to spam strangers scripted messages OR bug your friends and family ever again…

Click here to grab it all.

1. Develop Your Leadership Skills

When you break it down, people join people more than they join specific companies or business opportunities. 

The people you sponsor over your network marketing career need to see someone they can trust their future with. 

Nothing repels people more than weak leadership skills

Don’t worry if you’re not sure how to be a great leader today. It’s not something you’re born with. It’s a skill you can develop. 

Do Google searches about leadership. Buy some courses. Read leadership books. Anything by John Maxwell is a good place to begin. 

1a. What Leaders Don’t Do

What you’ll learn is that leaders don’t chase friends and family. 

Leaders don’t attack their social media contacts with crazy messages about getting rich. 

Leaders don’t post product pictures on social media praying that someone randomly clicks on their store link, buys and makes them rich

1b. What Leaders Are Good At

A leader learns how to attract quality prospects to them. 

There’s a way of marketing that’s called Attraction Marketing.

It’s a method for putting out content that’s educational. This content attracts targeted prospects who need the solutions your products and business opportunity provide. 

Would you rather chase people and give them the creepy feeling that they’re being stalked? 

Do you want people unfriending you on Facebook and friends running the other way each time they see you? 

Or, would you rather get good at a form of marketing that helps you target people who have the problems your business solves? 

And then, put out content or ads that attract those targeted prospects based on authentic solution-based messaging? 

Wouldn’t you rather be looked upon as a leader who provides real solutions to people who are actively searching for them…

…as opposed to being seen as a pest by your friends, family or co-workers? 

Your MLM recruiting goals become far easier to accomplish once you’ve developed your leadership skills and put Attraction Marketing into proper use

YouTube video

1c. Address COVID-19 & Recessionary Times As a Leader

We’ve been met with some strange times, haven’t we?

COVID-19 turned millions of lives upside down. Over 22 million jobs were lost immediately in America alone. 

These aren’t “normal” times. The economy is in trouble. Your prospects have lost their jobs or are scared about losing their jobs. 

They’re fearful about affording their mortgages and feeding their families, let alone the luxuries in life. 

Speak to this. Help them understand the way to a create side income with you. 

None of us can predict what’s going to happen in the future.

The only thing we can do is work hard, to the best of our ability, toward building businesses that work in good times and bad. 

Network marketing is one of the best recession-proof businesses because we can build our businesses from home

Internet marketing eliminates the need to do the 3-foot rule or home meetings. You can make sales and turn on a network marketing recruiting machine via online strategies. 

MLM is recession-proof because it’s during tough economic times that your prospects are hyper-senstive to making more money. 

Don’t hide behind these issues. Address them, calm your prospects down as best you can and help people thrive with you. 

2. Be Ethical With Your MLM Recruiting

The competition in multi-level marketing is stiff.

There are literally thousands of options your potential reps can take.

You’re competing with all the other network marketing opportunities.

You’re competing with all the Internet affiliate marketing opportunities your prospects are bombarded with.

Some network marketers turn to unscrupulous marketing tactics. I’ve seen it happen. I’ve seen how quickly those organizations fall apart, too.

  • Don’t lie to your prospects to increase your recruiting numbers.
  • Run your business “above the bar”.
  • Plan upfront to take time to establish a healthy and lasting relationship with your people.

3. Make a Solid Decision

Just decide…

…to create a large network marketing business…

…and don’t give up until the finish line is crossed. 

  • Will you have some obstacles to overcome? 
  • Will you feel fear at times as you’re learning new skills? 
  • Will you feel insecurity along the way? 

Yes, you will feel all those things. 

I encourage you to make a decision right now that you’ll push through all of it and focus at getting good at MLM recruiting until your business provides the passive income that makes a difference in your life.

Feature Download (if you’re a struggling MLM rep):

I’ve put together a free “MLM Quick-Start Video Guide” that shows you How To Attract 3-7 New MLM Customers & Team Members Per Week Without Prospecting A Single Person.

In it, I show you how to intimately know the pains & goals of your prospects so that you attract the BEST leads for your business.

You’ll never have to spam strangers scripted messages OR bug your friends and family ever again…

Click here to grab it all.
Related Reading:

How The Attraction Marketing Formula Will Build Your MLM Business

My Review Of The Attraction Marketing Formula

How To Buy Leads For Your Network Marketing Business

4. Sponsor Your Recruits

Focus on sponsoring your recruits. I mean you must put in time to build relationships & help them have success. Give them the resources they need to understand your products and business.

Anyone can “recruit” another person.

Sponsoring means investing time in your people. Investing this time in them will increase your retention rate and boost your residual income.

Caveat: Only invest time training folks who truly want to build a biz. Your network marketing recruiting plan must allow you to differentiate who deserves your precious time.

5. Love Your Products

You gotta LOVE your products. Selling something you don’t love is the ultimate lie. If you don’t love your company & products you won’t be able to market it properly.

If you’re not passionate about the company you chose I recommend you stop what you’re doing immediately.

Look around for a company you can get behind with all your heart & soul. Partner with a company you can take pride in.

The compensation plan is a part of this thinking process.

  • Is it favorable?
  • Does it pay a quality upfront commission and help you build residual income?
  • Will your recruits be excited with the payouts?

Love the products & the comp plan…that combo will equal passion and excitement.

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FREE MLM Business Training

6. Good Recruiting Plan = Forget Family & Friends

Look, it’s not 1985 anymore! The Internet puts the entire world at your marketing fingertips.

I don’t believe in the friends and family list. Unless you’re a highly respected businessperson in your local area, forget the warm contact list. Yes, I just said that!

IF your friends & family join (a big IF) they usually join because they feel obligated.

If they lack passion for building a home based business, then they’ll be negative and pull you down.

Avoid mixing friendship with business.

Recruit people who are authentically interested in network marketing.

Recruit people with a fire in their belly for success.

Your drunk Uncle Bob doesn’t fit the profile.

Click here for specific help w/ your MLM recruiting and prospecting plan.

7. Develop an MLM Recruiting Mindset

Did you join your network marketing company with an eye on the possibilities that residual income presents for your life? 

Develop an MLM recruiting mindset. Focus your time and attention on finding other business builders. 

Don’t apologize to anyone about what you’re working on. Sift through the people who say “no” or ask dumb questions like, “Is this a pyramid?”. 

Keep going until you uncover people who think like you do.

Remember that network marketing isn’t about convincing others about why they need to think differently.

It’s not about fighting with people who will never become interested in growing a business with you. 

Instead, it’s a process where you show the plan to a few people each day until someone says, “yes, this is what I want to do, too!”.

Then, get to work helping that person enter the system and grow with you.

This is what you should worry about when building an MLM business.

8. Think Long Term

Building a sustainable MLM business that brings financial security is a long-term effort. But with all the “get rich quick” marketing out there, it’s easy to become confused.

Don’t treat your business like a 30-day miracle diet. Miracle diets don’t exist and neither do miracle business opportunities.

Anyone with any measure of success in network marketing will tell you it takes at least 18 months to make real, measurable progress. It takes 5-10 years to become truly wealthy.

Is there a small 1% who have done it faster?

Sure…but are you going to bet your future on the lottery mentality or the solid business building mentality?

Your MLM recruiting plan requires that you think long-term.

  • You won’t get frustrated.
  • You won’t get distracted by others promising get rich quick opps on Facebook.
  • You’ll stay the course & WIN.

9. You, Inc Is Most Important

Your network marketing recruiting plan should include an understanding and implementation of the You, Inc concept.

I mentioned above that MLM has created many success stories.

In reality, 97% of all people who start a network marketing business are struggling or flat-out fail. It’s the nonsense of the 3-foot rule & other ineffective marketing training that causes this situation.

In today’s modern, cluttered marketing environment you must set yourself apart. The You, Inc strategy solves this for you.

You, Inc teaches you correct 21st Century marketing methods. All top earners eventually learn it & use it.

9a. What’s You, Inc? 

Simply put, it’s the mentality that you are the center of your business.

People join people, not companies.

You, Inc is a philosophy that matches up with Attraction Marketing, where you focus on becoming the best possible leader. 

  • That leadership shines through.
  • Your prospects see it.
  • They want to join your business and work with you because they see that you’re dedicated to their success. 

It goes back to what I mentioned above: 

Put out content that educates and pulls people with problems you can solve into your world instead of chasing people and bugging them to buy something they don’t want.

Feature Download (if you’re a struggling MLM rep):

I’ve put together a free “MLM Quick-Start Video Guide” that shows you How To Attract 3-7 New MLM Customers & Team Members Per Week Without Prospecting A Single Person.

In it, I show you how to intimately know the pains & goals of your prospects so that you attract the BEST leads for your business.

You’ll never have to spam strangers scripted messages OR bug your friends and family ever again…

Click here to grab it all.

10. Don’t Become Attached To The MLM Recruiting Outcome 

Years ago, one of my mentors told me, “Matt, don’t be addicted to the outcome.”

I didn’t get it at first. 

What he meant was this:

Don’t put your business in front of people and then become dejected when they say “no”. 

A great analogy is McDonald’s when they ask, “Do you want fries with that?”

If you say no, does the McDonald’s employee who asked you that say to themselves, “Man, I’m terrible at my job. They don’t want fries. I should just quit now.”?

Of course not, right? That would be silly LOL

But people do it in network marketing all the time. They present the opportunity and then think they’re terrible when a prospect doesn’t want to move forward. 

I know because that was me years ago until I learned to stop doing that to myself!

All we’re doing is giving people another option to look at that has the potential to fix their problem (your product) or create more income for themselves (your business opportunity). 

Don’t take it personally if they don’t want it. 

Don’t become attached to that outcome. 

This goes the other way, by the way 

Don’t get overly excited when you get a “yes”. It has the potential to make you relax because it feels so good to get that “yes”.

Celebrate your wins. That’s important. 

But go right back into sales and recruiting mode because you can’t count on one sale to make or break your future. 

Learn what to say to your prospects.

11. Create Productive Daily Habits

Winning in network marketing is all about positive and consistent action steps. Develop positive habits. 

There isn’t any magic here. You need to show your business to a few people every day. Doing that will work the numbers in your favor. 

Most people will say “no”.

That’s perfectly fine.

Stay consistent, keep a positive mental attitude and you’ll eventually build that core team that wants to grow big with you. 

Here are the core positive, daily habits:

  • Show the plan to new prospects
  • Show your products to new prospects
  • Work with your team leaders
  • Read or listen to positive personal development material

It doesn’t need to be any more complex than that. 

Now, you must decide how you’re going to find those daily prospects to sell products to and show the plan to. 

Are you going to work offline methods or online methods?

With the realities of COVID-19, I suggest that becoming excellent at online MLM marketing is the most important aspect of 21st Century network marketing success

Do you really want to do tons of 1on1 coffee shop meetings or drag friends to another opportunity meeting when you could attract interested prospects to your business via quality online marketing techniques? 

Add daily online content creation to your positive and productive daily habits and you’ll eventually have dozens of daily leads flowing into your business.

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FREE MLM Business Training

12. Don’t Focus On Negative People

Your MLM recruiting efforts will bring you into contact with thousands of people over the next several years. 

I have people ask me all the time how they can convince a negative person to turn their thinking around and join the business. 

Don’t do that. 

Move on. 

It requires an incredible amount of energy to change a negative person’s thinking into a more positive mode. 

You don’t have time to become a therapist. 

I’m always looking for people with a positive attitude.

That’s a person I can work with and teach new business skills to. I can’t help a person who sees the negative in everything. 

You can’t either. They’ll drain your energy and leave you feeling frustrated and negative. 

Focus on uncovering those positive folks who are fun to work with….which is another network marketing recruiting secret, by the way:

Make this business fun. Life is too short for anything else. 

13. Listen and Ask the Right Questions

Network marketing recruiting is two parts listening and one part talking. 

All of us tend to talk too much. I still fight this issue all the time.

We get excited and want to explain everything all at once. 

You need to remember how you made your own decision to join network marketing.

Did you get the information blasted into your face all at once or did you hear something exciting…

…and then started investigating for more details after that? 

It’s more likely that you came to your decision over time after finally putting all the pieces together. 

Your prospects need to make their own decisions the same way you did. 

Avoid the annoying habit of talking too much and fire-hosing your information at people. This doesn’t work because people feel like they’re being sold when you do this. 

People don’t like being sold. They want the freedom to investigate what you’re talking about in detail piece by piece until they feel comfortable enough to get started. 

You will do yourself and your prospect a ton of good if you learn the art of asking questions and then listening intently as you allow the other person to speak. 

You’ll learn a lot about the other person. 

They’ll respect you. 

Many of them will join because you gave them a little bit of info and then listened to everything they had to say in response.

14. Handle the Pyramid Scheme Question

One of the first questions you’ll get when MLM recruiting is, “Isn’t this a pyramid scheme?” 

The answer is no.

Show your prospects that you’re selling a product.

Pyramid schemes don’t use products. They offer an investment that can’t stand on its own.

15. Focus On Long-Term Relationships

A successful network marketer using attraction works to build long-term relationships.

You’re not just looking for a customer or a distributor. You’re looking for a business partner.

You’re looking for new members who share your vision and who want to help you grow your business.

When you focus on building relationships, you’ll find that MLM recruiting becomes much easier.

16. Get Good At Handling Rejection

You’re going to get rejected when working with potential recruits.

Don’t take it personally. Keep moving forward.

Remember that every “no” gets you closer to a yes.

17. Get Good At Following Up

One of the most important skills you can develop is the ability to follow up with your prospects.

You need to be able to reach out and touch them regularly until they make a decision.

18. Practice Your Elevator Pitch

You need to explain your business model in the best way that’s clear and concise.

Tell good stories.

In 30 seconds or less, show potential new distributors why they’re a good fit for your network marketing opportunity.

19. Invite Prospects To Events

Events are great network marketing recruitment opportunities.

You can hold local events or attend national events.

This part of the art of MLM recruiting helps your target audience see MLM companies and direct selling in a positive light.

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20. Use Social Media To Grow Your Business

Use the various social media platforms as powerful MLM recruitment tools.

They can help you reach new friends and grow your business.

Make sure you’re using the social media marketing strategy correctly.

Share valuable content and stories. Invite people to learn more about the network marketing industry.

21. Give Prospects a Reason to Join Your Team

You need to clearly answer the question, “Why should I join your team?”

Be clear about the value you offer.

Your new MLM distributors need to feel enough motivation to join your team.

22. Train Your New Distributors

When you bring new people into the fold, you need to train and support them.

You need to help them get started on the right foot.

The goal is to help your new team members become successful MLM recruiters.

23. Teach Your Team How To Use Social Media

As I mentioned above, social networks are powerful tools for the recruiting process.

But you need to teach your team how to use it correctly.

Show them how to share great content. Help them understand the best ways to connect with new people and build a big retail business.

24. Use Content Marketing Strategies

Content marketing is a form of inbound marketing.

Creating valuable content will attract a greater number of people to your company’s products.

You can use blog posts, articles, videos, and more to attract new leads and realize the benefits of network marketing.

25. Keep Track Of Your Progress

Tracking your MLM team-building efforts.

This will help you see what’s working and what’s not.

You can use a simple spreadsheet to track your progress.

Just make sure you’re consistent with it.

These MLM recruiting tips should help you grow your business quickly.

YouTube video
Feature Download (if you’re a struggling MLM rep):

I’ve put together a free “MLM Quick-Start Video Guide” that shows you How To Attract 3-7 New MLM Customers & Team Members Per Week Without Prospecting A Single Person.

In it, I show you how to intimately know the pains & goals of your prospects so that you attract the BEST leads for your business.

You’ll never have to spam strangers scripted messages OR bug your friends and family ever again…

Click here to grab it all.
use these network marketing recruiting tips to build a team like these smiling folks

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