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MLM Best Practices

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MLM Best Practices

It’s not always easy to know the right things to do for your business, but following these 5 MLM best practices will put your company on the fast-track for success:

The  5 MLM best practices that every company should follow:


1. Provide Higher-Quality Products

From its foundation, the MLM industry was built on the value proposition of delivering higher-quality products and services to consumers.

2. Build a Resilient Supply Chain

This enables you to quickly adapt to changing market conditions, a natural disaster, or a breakdown in your primary supply chain.


3. Leverage Technology

Your investment in technology is critical to your success in today’s ever-changing environment. Be innovative and current so that you can give your field a competitive advantage.

4. Prepare for Success

Everyone wants rapid growth, but growth can be your most significant hurdle unless you make a plan to prepare for it.

5. Expect Some Failure

Stumble Forward. Success only comes to those who attempt something great and fail, then learning from the mistakes, move forward again.

Successful MLM businesses’ are fluid and are continually adjusting to fluctuations in consumer demand by doubling down on the things that are working well and creating positive results. To help your company gain additional insights on where you may want to focus some attention, we’ve compiled the top five areas where we most often see the need for establishing mlm best practices. If your company has already addressed these areas, it never hurts to do a check-up. However, if you find any of them lacking, it might be time to develop a plan to address any significant vulnerabilities.

mlm best practices

Provide Higher-Quality Products:

The MLM industry was built on delivering the value proposition of higher-quality products and services. Selling a level “above” traditional retail sets your brand apart and provides the perceived value required for a premium pricing strategy. Marketing experts have long understood that brands with higher-quality products have more repeat sales, far fewer returns, and more loyal customers. All of those benefits add up to increased trust.

Consumer trust is so closely linked with purchase decisions that financial leaders have coined the term “The Trust Economy,” to convey the currency-like effect that trust has on global markets as well as individual businesses. Many experts believe that consumer trust is essential for success. Selling higher-quality products is an excellent way to tip the scales of trust in a positive direction for your company.

Build a Resilient Supply Chain:

Threats to your supply chain are a direct threat to your business. Agility, speed-to-market, and end-to-end visibility are essential performance areas when building resiliency into your chain of suppliers. A pandemic, plant shutdowns, natural disasters, and unexpected quality issues are all risks to your supply chain. The likelihood and consequence of these threats can be devastating if no plan for resiliency is in place. Creating “a flexible supply chain” with redundant back-up providers identified will enable you to respond to fluctuations in supply and demand dynamically. Creating strategic adjustments in your supply chain is an underutilized best practice for maximizing your profit.

Leverage Technology:

Technology is the backbone of the MLM business model. The quality of your software can affect every part of your business, including your Customer Experience. When looking for an MLM software provider, evaluate the company’s ability to provide a “complete solution” for your company. The more vendors you have — the more money it will cost. Multiple software vendors also dramatically extend the time it takes to troubleshoot and resolve unexpected events.

A complete solution should include Genealogy Management, Commissions Engine, a Consultant & Customer CRM, Support Tickets, API Access, and Rep Tools. Additional features that you may not need immediately, but should be available from your software include a client configurable Promotions Engine, International Countries and Currencies, and a branded Mobile App. Look for a platform that is updated regularly with new features and enhancements to ensure that the ROI on your MLM software continues to increase year over year.

Prepare for Success: 

Everyone wants rapid growth, but success can be your most significant hurdle unless you plan for it in all aspects of your business.  Success is built on executing sound business principles such as following a business plan, ensuring the relevancy of your product and company, and exploring new products and services to expand your target market.  When you apply the principals of success to your business, it’s smart to make a rapid scaling plan.  If your product is the “next big thing,” you will need to be able to scale with little notice and capitalize on the surge in demand.   How would your manufacturing and logistics needs change if you grew 10x?  1,000X? 

Which suppliers could scale with you, and who will you outgrow? What can be delegated? What can be automated? Preparing for success allows you to make incremental changes along the way while continuing to deliver a positive customer experience through each stage of your growth.

Expect Some Failure: 

The outward success that we observe in companies is the final step in a journey that is typically filled with many failures and stumbling blocks that have all been overcome.  Failure is a crucial component of success.  If you aren’t failing regularly in some of your results, you may not be taking enough risks to reach your full potential.  When some failure is expected and even encouraged in your culture, it becomes part of the success process.  The freedom to fail, without the fear of retribution, unlocks tremendous creativity in your team. Often the fear of failure keeps employees stuck in a comfort zone to avoid risks and keeps the company in a  downward spiral of the status quo. If you are not continuously moving forward in your business, you are moving backward. There is no standing still. 

Each day you benefit from the cumulative lessons learned and incremental improvements made as a result of 10,000

failed attempts to create the light bulb. When you persevere beyond temporary failures, your business is set up to thrive, and the impact of your results will likely exceed your biggest dream, just as it did with Thomas Edison.

Leveraging the 5 MLM Best Practices allows you to plan, manage and execute on the things that matter most in your business, while avoiding many of the costly mistakes that other companies have made trying to solving similar problems. Whatever problem your company is facing, someone else in our industry has faced it before. ByDesign specializes in providing our clients with a complete ecosystem of solutions and trusted partners. Our solutions have been designed based on the best practices learned from the failures and successes of more than 1,000 clients.

Learn more at ByDesign.com or contact us to schedule a demo.

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