The Agreement Seekers Blog

First, let me preface: Without giving away too much about what makes our marketing group unique, it is safe to say that we seek to establish stable, long-term relationships. This is done within the context of a community. We rely on and support each other in building businesses that create financial stability. The kind of stability that evolves into higher and higher levels of prosperity.  Individual by individual, this defines what we do as we grow participation in our groups. This being said, how we initially approach and market to the groups we target has everything to do with the initial contact(s) we make.  We do this through asking for permission (if they are receptive to?) receiving further information about what we offer.   In this context, the chapters that Seth Godin shares a great primer to get your head around how we build large, stable organizations.  We are not mass marketers in the traditional sense, but very specifically and intentionally are thoughtful, courteous

Is there a right way and a wrong way to approach a home business?  Around the Holidays, between Thanksgiving and New Years (every year) there are always multiple promotions from different "follow me and my system" marketers.  Typically, they host webinars and then have a campaign to follow-up (forever) until you unsubscribe. There are a lot of clues left by this process.  The problem is that for the vast majority of people, the skills sets required to execute this kind of "marketing funnel" to a targeted national or worldwide audience are well beyond their time and talent.  So, even though there are many examples of state-of-the-art processes, building one yourself is an extremely tall order. Some advocate "the only way" is through paid advertising and they will show you how to make it happen.  Others sell the process itself and include landing page builders integrated with free offers and auto-responder campaigns.  Many or most of these have affiliate

There is a point of confusion that most digital marketers to not adequately address. This entire blog talks about culture and community, and here's why. Businesses (can) come and go.  Unless you literally "own" the company - you are promoting someone else's opportunity.  You are not in control of your business.  What you do control, however, are the relationships, the "group think" and the alliances and common purpose you build with people. This is your asset - and it is all relationship-based.  Some call it your "list".  And... the industry adage is "the money is in your list".  Actually, some marketers advocate collecting names and having a lot of names to make different offers to - over time.  As such, they say that this large list is the asset.  I agree with this to a point, but am also inclined to disagree. There is also the industry mantra of "know, like and trust".  The admonition is that people need to know, like

You can click on any of following sites to get a sense of how we approach market segmentation and drill down on specific groups, or geographic areas.  You will note they are all "neutral" in terms of contact information and does not disclose nor link to the business that drives our incomes. Also, you will note that each site is built on a FREE Google Sites host.  They are simple, one page sites that encourage people to get back to the person who led them to the information.  As you advance in your skill sets, you can develop your own. In any event, here's the list: 401Konundrum  - Targeted to people who are about to retire, but have done a less than adequate job at saving and planning for it. Business Owners  - Targeted to individually owned, small retail shops, food establishments, child care centers, contractors, etc. Independent Grad - Targeted to college students, including fraternities and sororities as well as student organizations.  These can and shou

This is critical.  People need to launch to profitability as quickly as possible.  This does not happen on its own - and therefore hand holding, cajoling or any other means of motivation in the first weeks is essential. Perhaps a bit over-stated, but the general idea is that if people are in profit, there is no reason to quit. Therefore, initial profitability is a first little insurance policy.  It follows that to get into profit, something needed to have been "done".  It is a bit more complicated than wash, rinse, and repeat because at that point the "recruit" having just had their initial success - now has two roles, instead of one.  In addition to finding people to get involved, they need to apply the skills necessary to support their newly enrolled person. This defines the life cycle of our business:  enroll and support.  Or said differently:  marketing and teaching.  It defines the success cycle.  We really only do two things:  1) find and enroll people int

Your main responsibility as a business owner (in our business) is to do all you can to ensure people [those you rely on for their monthly participation in your on-going income] have success.  This happens on a number of levels, the most fundamental one is ensuring you develop a relationship and you engender a culture that includes a sense-of-belonging. Servant leadership obviously involves serving.  There is nothing more important than serving others and ensuring they are on track and have the skills and habits to apply on a daily basis.  We are in the people development business.  If "our" people are not evolving and gaining competencies (incrementally, day by day, week by week) then our business(es) will be made of sticks, and not of bricks.  (Three Little Pigs analogy, intentional) The tools of the trade in this regard are that of any other relationship.  Phone calls, emails, texts, participation group training, getting on company calls.  You need to get comfortable wi

This is a provocative title that is potentially off-putting.  I understand. It is really meant to be an attention grabber and nothing more.  So allow me to apologize if it raised your eyebrow. In writing about "ignorance being expensive", the reality is most people have not taken the time to understand the difference between active and passive income, not even mentioning how to make it happen. Most people have a job and pay their bills and are content with the cards they have been dealt.  They get up every Monday morning and do it again and trudge through to the following weekend.  Of the active income they earn, perhaps some is saved.  For most, little is invested.  It is how most people describe (and end up in) the rat race. All we are here to tell you is that there is an alternative.  It is passive income.  You do the work once, and the same money comes month after month after month - passively, and grows geometrically. This is the model we operate under. Nothing

If you already have a successful business, what we do will complement (not compete with) what you currently do.  As such, we are a diversification option. There was an analogy that I heard recently that you cannot be the pastor of two churches under two denominations.  The question posed was 'what do you really believe' and those who follow (attend your church) would have legitimate cause to wonder what your true convictions are?  If you are marketing products within the same category, I would be inclined to agree... i.e. two weight loss products, two skin care lines, two anti-oxidant health drinks, two travel companies... name your deal... We represent a tools, training and education"deal".  Our business ramps quickly due to person-to-person commerce with no money going to the parent company, other than a monthly administrative fee to cover the back office and on-going product development. Therefore, what we do, does not compete with product or service-based bu

The definition of security differs for everyone.  For some, having a "secure job" meets their definition.  For others, being on a track for a secure retirement needs to fit into the equation.  For many, the idea of not having to depend on someone else is key to their definition.  In this sense, security has everything to do with control - and having the ability to control your life and your future. Our market is not people who fit neatly into the first two categories and who are satisfied with their stable existence.  Therefore, right off of the top, we can exclude 80% of the population who are employed and buying-in to the conventional American dream of a house, a car and meeting all of their bills. Your potential success will be affected if you do not understand this reality.  And, it begs the question of who we target as "higher" probability prospects.  Are there groups/populations who inherently have an "itch to scratch" as it relates to security a

There are a lot of ways to write about this. The obvious one is to make football or basketball analogies, and then have the discussion evolve to leadership with quarterbacks and point guards. Somehow, I think all this has already been done. As such, I am not going to go in that direction, but more importantly want to contextualize "team" and what it means to "our" sport.  So, let me start here: a team is a group of people who work together with the common goal of winning a game.  Our game is money. Teams practice and have coordinated strategies (plays) that define what everyone's role is for bursts of time.  The question then becomes, what "plays" do we run and how do we coordinate among ourselves in our business?  And, even before this, what drills do we run in practice to sharpen and refine fundamental skills and mechanics? All of this is completely analogous to athletics.  However, there are plenty of opportunities to learn about individual sk

This post is about mindset.  The home-based business industry typically has used the words recruit, enroll, sponsor, get sign-ups... to define the activity of business building. I want to tweak this just a bit.  There is more to the proposition beyond the next silver ball being loaded - and then flung up to the top of the pin ball machine and left to bounce around - and then needing to be whacked to keep it in play. When we "find people to support", the idea from the outset is that we need to understand how the person we are talking to.  Our orientation has to be how we can help someone.  In some cases, this will mean that we "turn down" people if we do not think they have a likelihood of success. This comes down to our assessments of people as potential business partners.  Have they taken the time to understand what we do?  Do they have the ability to articulate our business philosophy of learning and teaching?  Have they, in some manner, stated that they &qu

In general, I hesitate in talking too extensively about money. Although any business success  is ultimately "measured" by profitability, the money is the end and not the means... and without the means - talking about the end is simply a pipe dream.  This having been said, there is a path to retirement with our business.  The intent here is to share what this looks like. The first goal is the first sale.  It all begins here.  We need to attract just one person who is interested and believes in what we do.  This breaking-of-the-ice (and breaking even) is all important and will establish the first bit of conviction that what we do is viable and do-able - for you. Being realistic, we then need to learn how to grow.  As you grow, you can reach more things higher and higher on the learning tree and make connections between people and concepts.  During this time, you complement your income.  At first, it feels like tidbits and the return is not worth the investment.  This is how

Having been in or around the online money-making industry since the beginning of the internet, I have seen things come and go.  I am or have been on the email lists of many, many "gurus" who have marketed the latest and greatest systems, strategies and formulas. I have been exposed to and evaluated "money-making opportunities" that are every color of the rainbow, at investment levels from 5 cents to $52,000.  Systems that use phone broadcasting, to postcards, to auto-posting to social media, local guerilla marketing, email autoresponders and capture pages.  And this is just the tip of the possibilities  Frankly, all of these have their place (and) are a fit for some but not for others - based on your background and experience. To put it like my father would have said it, there are more ways to make money than "you can shake a stick at".  The corollary to this is that there is an equal number of people willing to impart advice on how to go about it.  

At the end of the day, among all the ways we define ourselves, we are a social business. When I came across The Seven Social Sins, it was an "ah-ha" moment because these encapsulate so much of the Working Poor No More philosophy and what we strive to communicate to people in the process of evaluating whether to join us. The Seven Social Sins are: Wealth without work. Pleasure without conscience. Knowledge without character. Commerce without morality. Science without humanity. Worship without sacrifice. Politics without principle. These represent our core values in regard to wealth, knowledge and commerce.  Of course, the rest are all good ponder fodder.  If you delve at any depth into this blog, you will find that wealth requires work, especially when like most of us, we start from nothing and incrementally build a business and better life. Commerce without morality is a key differentiator in our marketing community.  You will find that truth and

Isn't it interesting that a topic like Moral Authority is relevant in today's business environment, especially in the "home business" arena?  I have thought about this topic for quite some time and reflected on my life experience to illustrate something that I hope will be beneficial. When my kids were in Junior High, I started asking the same question in a couple of different ways. The first was, "How are you going to distinguish yourself as you get older?"  The second was, "What makes you exceptional?" I was trying to impress upon them that they need to stand for something.  I wanted to convey that someone trusting you - implicitly -  is the highest compliment and honor you can ever receive.  There is a great deal more that I tried to do in helping (them) form their character, but you get the idea... So, this is a nice tidbit of family nostalgia... but what does it have to do with business and the subject of Moral Authority? Moral Aut

We try very hard to not over-inflate what we do and stay firmly grounded in the practical and reasonable.  Our "appeal" is to anyone wanting or needing to stabilize their finances as a springboard to higher and higher levels of prosperity.  However, if you spend any time learning about our philosophy of doing business, this pre-supposes a lot. We strive to be perceived as calm and rational, and as the title states... to simply posture ourselves as a viable alternative in the total universe of money-making opportunities.  Our goal is not to appeal to everyone, but to appeal to people who will invest the time necessary to understand, on a very pragmatic level, "why" we are a special organization to be a part of. The title also mentions treadmill income.  This infers that most people who will find what we do appealing - are looking to elevate themselves beyond their frustration with a life of squeaking by and barely "making it".  People who go to a job

As a business owner, I want to attract decent, honorable people.  This is important on a number of levels, not the least of which are the implications of attracting the opposite. In my "day job", I manage a group of 72 people.  When I first introduce myself to any group I talk about having two extra eyes.  I then go on to explain that I really mean they need to have to extra "i's".  These two i's are initiative and integrity.  Decent, honorable people, for the most part, have these two i's. Let me tell you how I define them.  Integrity means that you are doing what you are supposed to be doing when no one is watching.  Initiative means that you do things on your own, without having to be told. In our business, you need to engage in productive daily activity.  Your sense of integrity needs to drive doing what you are supposed to be doing.  Discipline is absolutely essential.  And this rolls right into initiative because the only one you are accounta

Let me be clear.  Earning vehicles come and go and should not be the ultimate determining factor in your decision to get involved with something. Here's the point:  the value in what we do is relationship-based.  It is not about this deal or that opportunity, it is about the community that supports the concept of income generation.  This is the asset.  The network of positive, lasting relationships you build is directly proportional to the success you will have. As such, the business is secondary (essentially).  If you land on a good one, and it has "market permanence"... is well respected... all the better.  This is not to advocate that we should all be looking for the next shiny object, but it does not negate the fact that when people are tied into the pulse of "what is working now", mass migrations can and should take place to capitalize on the next-big-thing. This does not discount your core program or programs.  I strongly believe that a strong core p

This is what we do.  This is who we are.  We are an alliance of people who pool our knowledge and resources to make money.  It is really not complicated.  We share a common goal and are "allied" in achieving it. The rest is just details.  We market a subscription and need about 20-30 people participating (in a group) to replace most middle-class incomes.  We collectively  build to this point progressively and work with people to ramp up to profitability.  There are no secret formulas or inside strategies... but just common sense and practical steps to understand and implement. We reject the notions of simple and easy.  The fact is that if simple and easy defined what we do, everyone would be doing it and be successful.  We all know that this is not the case. Our job is to find people who will take the time to understand what we do.  Informed people with whom we develop a level of trust, choose to join us.  Again, it is really not complicated.  The challenge is to

Sounds like a movie title... actually it is the name of a song by Mike and the Mechanics.  But a time and place in this context has everything to do with things you choose. During the time you choose to "work", you will inherently be somewhere.  But where?  Do you (will you) have a place that is free of distraction?  Are you willing to turn off the television and focus? Can you find a space in your home to go to and close the door?  The obvious implication here is that you will enhance your chances of success if you do. If you work a day job, the obvious thing is that you will need to focus on your business during the evening.  If you work second shift, the reverse is true.  Understanding "time" is more important to your success than just about any other factor.  You will need to consciously choose to alter the way you have lived your life.  This means choosing to invest hours of your day(s) in different ways. This change and sacrifice will reward you with suc