Closing, prospects, network marketing.

Hi, I’m Ray Higdon and today we are going to talk about closing more prospects in network marketing. First, I’m going to share with you what every network marketer needs to stop doing when trying to close. Next I’m going to share with you the three elements to being a successful closer. Lastly I’m going to share with you the closing secrets that helped me close hundreds and hundreds of reps.

Inside of our Rank Makers community over the last three years, we have helped network marketers just like you bring in over 300,000 new customers, 71,000 new reps and achieve 14,000 rank advances. Before I was ever a coach or a trainer, I was the number one income earner of a network marketing company, so I understand what it’s like to be in the field. I was there, I’ve been there, done that and I want to help you get to the top of your company in every way that I know that can help. So let’s dive in. 

What is it that network marketers need to stop doing when it comes to closing?

That is stop trying to close everybody. Stop thinking that you shouldn’t take no for an answer, sometimes you should. You should not assume that every person around you or every person you ever run into whether it’s at a networking meeting, on social media or your friends and family. Don’t assume that they really need what it is that you have to offer and that they are brain dead if they do not join. It’s that kind of attitude that gives network marketing a bad name. Gives you a bad name, gives your company a bad name and it actually will repel people that might have been open to learning more.

If I’m saying do not try to close everyone, well what should you be doing? You should be seeing who’s open, that’s it. There are many qualified people that I talked to that I truly believe would have crushed it in network marketing that told me no and that was okay. I did not try to convince them. I did not bug them. I did not beg them or chase them. I did not tell them that they were an idiot if they did not do it. I asked, “are you open to learning more and if not, no big deal.” We remained friends and often I would follow up with them and sometimes they would express interest at some point in time but it was never pressure. It was never pushiness or me trying to hype it and tell them how easy it was or how you will never have to sell anything. I never did those things, I just said, “hey this is what I’m doing. If you’re open to learning more, great. If not, no big deal.” No one was offended by that. No one ever said, “we are no longer friends.” No one reacted that way because I was not trying to close everyone, I was just seeing who was open.

What are the three elements to closing?

Technically there are four elements, pipeline, posture, position, perspective. But we are going to focus on the first three today.

Pipeline, what is pipeline? It’s very simple, it’s your numbers. How many people you are reaching out to, how many people you are following up with, how many appointments are you setting, if you’re in a business that sends samples, how many samples are you sending, how many people are you getting on videos et cetera. Your pipeline is your numbers. This is true of anything that’s performance based. If you are a realtor then you have a list of people that you are prospecting to try to either get their listing, do an open house or show a listing. You have a pipeline. If you are in mortgages, when I was in mortgages I had a pipeline. I had the Hernandez family, it’s in underwriting and we got two loans going for them. I knew what was in process.

Most network marketers don’t do that, they don’t treat it like a business, they treat it like a hobby. They hope that they reach out to someone and they join right away and that’s not usually the case. In fact about 98% of sales happen on the follow-up, not in the initial reach out. What’s your pipeline? If you have the desire to become a top earner in your company but you’re reaching out to fewer than 10 people a week, you probably are not going to get there. How many people are you reaching out to, how many are you following up with etc. Pipeline is a very, very big deal.

Number two, position. You need to always know what is the position of your prospect. Now in tip number one, I talked about how to stop trying to close everyone and instead see if they’re open. Well that’s the key to move someone from position zero to position one. See if they’re open. “Are you open to learning more?” If I don’t have information that says you’re open or you have a desire to learn more, then you’re at position zero. The way to get you to position one is by me saying,hey, are you open to learning more?” and if they say “yes.” Now, they are at position one because they raised their hand. Position is one of those keys we talk a lot about on this blog and on our YouTube channel we really dive into how to use position for closing.

The third element is posture. Posture is I would say the biggest difference between a super closer and someone who just does okay. Posture is the belief in what you have regardless of external acceptance or approval. When my wife was 21 years old, she joined my network marketing team. We were not married yet and she went home to her dad and her family and said, “guys, I’m in network marketing now” and they were really excited. No, I’m just kidding, they were not excited. They’re like.. “uh, what, a pyramid thing? You are getting your college degree, why are you doing this?” I mean they did everything but throw holy water at her. I mean they literally thought that I was a demon spawn or something. She had the absence of acceptance, approval or agreement but when she hit ten thousand dollars a month at the age of 21, her mom joined, her two brothers joined and her dad built her a spreadsheet. He said, “look here sweet pea, if you get two and they get two…..” She had posture. If she required acceptance, approval or agreement from her family, she never would have created a career inside of network marketing. Instead she had posture. Posture is how easily are you affected by the opinions of others? Most people, very easily. You have to have posture if you want to get more results in network marketing.

One thing before I share Closing Secrets.

Before we get to my last point where I’m going to share with you some of my closing secrets, make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel, Higdongroup.com/channel. If you are wanting to improve in pipeline, posture, position and perspective, it is the channel for you. Make sure you subscribe and drop me a comment. Let me know what’s resonated with you so far. I would love to hear from you. I do answer every single comment on our channel. We love our community and are  so grateful for you. So make sure you subscribe and then drop me a comment if you have an area that you think you need help with or something that’s resonated with you already.

What are some of these closing secrets?

Actually these secrets are questions. I’m going to give you two of my favorite. When we talk about position, my job was to see how many people were at position zero that I could just move to position one. My job was to see who’s open and that’s also your job. It wasn’t to close everyone, it was to see who was open. I asked a lot of people, “hey, are you open to learning more. I’m doing this thing, if you’re open to it, great, if not, no big deal. Would you be open to taking a look at what I’m doing?” Now you know the kind of question to move them from zero to one. Next I would say and this is a little mini closing blueprint here but then I would say, “I have a video that does a much better job than I could do explaining it. Would you be open for me sending you that video so you could watch it?” They say yes.” Now I have moved from position zero, they weren’t open to position one, they’re open to position two they’re open to receiving a video.

The next position would be they actually watch the video. Then I follow up with them, “hey did you get a chance to watch the video?” Here’s where we will break it down to two of my favorite things around closing. Number one, let’s say that they say, “it was horrible” (guess what that’s going to happen). Even if your video is amazing and you have a Kardashian on jet skis and the circus and monkeys playing banjos, doesn’t matter how amazing this video is, someone somewhere is going to say that sucked, it was terrible, waste of time, that’s fine. I actually recruited hundreds of people that didn’t like the video. Now doesn’t that sound magical or mystical or weird? The reason is I understand position.

You see there’s a lot of stuff people could be doing. They could be watching dances with the stars, they could be mindlessly just scrolling TikTok forever. There’s so many things that people could be doing, they could be throwing the frisbee, they could be chasing their dog, they could be doing dance lessons, whatever, but they said I would like to watch that video and they actually watched it. Who does that? The person that does that is the person that’s seeking. They’re seeking something, they’re looking for something in their life. They’re looking to make more money or depending on your product, maybe they’re looking to lose weight or have more energy, but they’re looking for something and that’s where position comes in.

In the absence (you may want to write this down) of progress, fall back on position. If I can’t move forward but they’re further than position zero then I’ll fall back on their position that we have established. If someone says yes, agreed to watch the video, watched it and then said, “that video sucked,”

I’m going to say, “okay, geez. Wow!

I’m going to pretend like this is the first time hearing negative feedback in my entire life. All through grade school I just sailed through, you’re a great artist, Ray. I never heard any negative feedback ever anywhere in my world and this is my first time encountering this foreign sticky substance called negative feedback. I don’t know what to do with it. Even if I’ve heard it the last 99 people I have talked to, I’m going to act like wow, that’s really weird.

“You didn’t like it?” (Okay, what do I do here?)

Then I’m going to say, “well what were you hoping to see?”

What were you hoping to see,” is the bridge question that takes them from I hated the video to telling you what their actual desires are, which I have never had anything crazy come out of that. It’s always like well I wanted to make extra money or I wanted to do this at night or I wanted to do this as a couple or I wanted to do it as a single person. I have never had anyone say something that I couldn’t actually solve with the company. That’s why them liking or not liking the video isn’t that important. So remember position.

The last piece here is…let’s say they did like the video, yay, and they like the video. You say, “what did you like best about what you saw?” and they start rattling off things. Now if I feel like they have loaded up the chamber enough that I have enough ammunition, that they’re ready to go…then I’ll say, “wow, that’s awesome. I agree completely and man, sounds to me like you’re ready to join.” Now if you check out the video at the top of this post you will notice that it is not a question, it’s a statement. Notice the tonality, sounds to me like you’re ready to join. Not sounds to me like your ready to join? You ready to join? Now join my team. I never said that. I never asked the question would you like to join my team now? I said, “based on what you said, sounds to me like you’re ready to join.” Period, not question mark, that’s how I recruited a lot of people.

Addional information.

If you want more explanations around that, we dive deep on closing inside of our YouTube channel so again, make sure that you subscribe. Now if you would like my very best prospecting and recruiting questions, here is the link Higdongroup.com/30questions, totally free resource. It’s my 30 favorite prospecting and recruiting questions. Click the link above and it will take you right there. You will be able to download it for free and I know it’s going to help you.

Ray Higdon

Play Bigger. Make An Impact.


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