Updates

I am on my way to Houston!!!!

Well, not physically, but I made my goal and actually got 9 people active in time to register for the Leadership Conference and I am getting a $300 gift card when I get there! I get to room with my director and best friend so its going to be a blast. I am only sad that my two consultant friends I never see, Deanna and Kelly, are not able to be there this year. We'll have to wait until next year.

I went to Gloria Mayfield Banks' Magical Advance again this year and it was GREAT! Not only was the training powerful, but all of the classes were put on CD and we were able to pick them up on the last day. So I can always pop in a CD to remind me of what I learned there. That was really where I got my confidence and knew for sure that I was going to make it happen and get to Houston.

The day I got home the most amazing thing happened. I got an email from my personal website from a girl who wanted to become a consultant! I didn't have to go out and find her, she came to me. So I went over the opportunity with her and she instantly signed up. She is a great consultant and was the first person in our unit to become a star this quarter! Im so proud of her. And the best part is, she is doing all of this while barely carrying any inventory at all. Everytime she places an order it means that someone has ordered from her. She is making sale after sale and her first party on her own she sold over $800 worth of products! I am so happy that she found me and wanted to sign up under me. I really lucked out that day.

That's it for now. I'm sure I have more I could say but it's all slipped my mind. Good luck to everyone out there in these last few days of 2010 trying their best to get to Houston in January!

Whoa its been a long time

It's been a long time since I posted and LOTS has happened!

I went through DIQ and made it through my 4th month, when I got a 9-5 job and completely lost my focus. Of course a month later I lost my great new J-O-B and was no where close to be in a position to resubmit DIQ and make it a success.

That brought one a large depression in my life and my business suffered. I was scheduling facials and doing tables at Dress Barn but I was not booking parties which is the backbone of this business.

Over time many of my recruits fell off the face of the earth and I am currently struggling each month to stay a red jacket (minimum 3 active recruits). HOWEVER - I am working my business the right way by booking classes and actually holding them!

I am working with my wonderful Director and BFF at a David's Bridal store which is about 2 and a half hours away from home and spending just about every weekend in Pennsylvania (with my director) holding parties. Go where the people are. I havent had much success yet in building my business in my local area so I am doing what I can to find business.

It's my goal to get 7 active consultants in time to go to the Leadership Conference in Houston in January. Last year recruiting was easy, but the quality of my recruits were not good and many of them either became inactive or never became active in the first place. Now I want to recruit a team of worker bees :)

I got to go to the infamous Seminar and had the BEST time of my life. Not only was the whole thing spectacular, fun and educational but I got to wear a beautiful Tiara because I was the Queen of Wholesale and Queen of Recruiting for my unit! I could write a whole post about Seminar. Maybe I will, but not tonight.

I would just like to end with a little bit about my Director who is absolutely amazing. She is allowing me to drive her crazy and stay with her whenever I need to in order to work my business and be a success! I want to be a Director mainly because I want her to be a Senior Sales Director and for her to get everything she deserves! She works so hard and is so underappreciated. I wish I could do more for her but for now the best I can do is be there for her and (hopefully) not overstay my welcome in the coming weeks ;)

Mary Kay® Miniature Fragrance Collection (Includes miniature replicas of Affection®, Belara®, Bella Belara®, ELIGE®, journey®, and Velocity® all in a decorative gift box) is $34.00 this year! What a great gift this will make! Remember it is limited edition so its only available while supplies last.

I borrowed the text and picture from http://imdreamingpink.blogspot.com. Check out her blog! It's a lot of fun!

And some motivation finds me...

I actually recruited a new consultant today! Very happy because I was starting to feel down about myself!

Whoaaa its been a while

Seems I havent posted in almost 2 months. I guess you can say I am losing my momentum in my business. Just my momentum, not my love for the business. I really want to succeed and am trying to do the things my director and other people suggest. I know that I am still new and all, so time will change everything. It takes time to build up a customer base, so I have to be patient. Things happened very quickly at first and have slowed down considerably, but I am doing more booking now than before. Hopefully some of these facials will turn into parties and I can recruit some more women.

I decided to enter into DIQ. I definitely am looking back on that decision and thinking that I wasnt ready for that yet. I hope to finish out this first month but I am not holding my breath! I need more team members who are actually active besides a few personal use girls (not that I dont love those team members either). I just jumped in head first without being ready to meet the qualifications. My director will hate this post. She says I need to stop being negative so much. It's hard to be positive when you have 10 days and are $3000 short of what you need to make for car qualification AND Director in Qualification. Maybe there will be a miracle?

Mary Kay Article

I found this little article on Mary Kay that I thought I would share. It's really just general but it did have some interesting stuff in it!

http://www.tupper06.com/mary-kay-cosmetics.php

Bridal Shows

I signed up to do some bridal shows today. I have 2 so far, one in March and one in January. The March one I will do with my Mom and the other one with my director/bff Christina and my should be sister-in-law Jen. Hopefully we will get a bunch of leads at the shows!

I put out my first facial box yesterday and I was so proud of myself. I only hope that people fill out the slip. It's at Tantaztic at the Wildewood Center in California, MD if anyone wants to enter. I am raffling off 6 tans and one month membership to Worlds Gym of California, formerly Pro Fitness Health and Exercise. Pretty sweet deal. I bought the tans but my lovely friend til the end Mark gifted me the one month membership. I've contacted a few other places about putting out boxes.

I need leads! Does anyone else have any ideas on how to get more leads? I want to do shows and shows and shows so I can make $$$$$. I don't want to have to get a job.

My Recruitment Story

My first recruit was my mother. She was my number one customer and as we know you can’t build your business from friends and family alone because they expect a discount, and my Mom was using a lot of product and buying all the time getting the wholesale discount. So I talked to her about it and she decided to sign up and become my very first team member.

Shortly after that I was listening in on one of the conference calls, Jeanie mentioned the Pearls of Sharing. Well, I decided then I wanted my pearls.

It was a rough start because the first couple of phone calls we scheduled, either the girls weren’t there, didn’t answer or we would lose their call due to cell phone issues. We would reschedule over and over, but they still wouldn’t be there at the time when they were available. One girl that I played an online game with said she was interested in setting up the inner view phone call so we scheduled a time for her. We called and it rang. And rang. And rang. She never answered. I later chatted with her online and she said she was so sorry and she could do the call anytime after 2 the next day. So around 2:30 we called and it rang, and rang, and rang. I texted her and asked if she would like to reschedule her inner view and never heard back from her either.

It was frustrating and it was hard. All I wanted was to find just 3 people to listen to this practice interview because I myself had no clue how to share the opportunity with people. I had many people who would tell me that they would do the interview, but then never schedule a specific time, or we would call and they wouldn’t answer, but the point was I never gave up and I kept asking people TO HELP ME learn how to share this opportunity!!!.

one girl that I played an online game with said she would do the PRACTICE inner view. I was finally going to have my first interview!, but only to help me out for my training. She told me there was no way she was going to sign up, but by the end of the call she was so excited! She decided she was going to sign up and signed her agreement the very next day.

THEN I asked my sister-in-law if she would listen to the PRACTICE inner view and I had the same response from her! This was definitely something she wanted to do and I KNEW AND she knew she would be good at. One girl decided to go with ANOTHER HOME-BASED BUSINESS before we even did the inner view but I asked her if she would please help me get my pearl bracelet by doing one of the phone inner views – CAN YOU TELL HOW BAD I WANTED THOSE PEARLS?! Anyway, by the time we were done she was convinced she had made the wrong choice and is going to sign up for Mary Kay once she gets done with the initial obligation she has to her home-based business.

At the Magical Advance with Gloria Mayfield Banks, Gloria asked everyone what the first point was where they became really passionate about Mary Kay. Everyone said “oh when I went on target for the car” or “when I got my red jacket” and I told her that I became really passionate after the first person I personally talked to about the opportunity turned me down. Everyone looked at me funny and Gloria even did a double take and said “what?” and I told her that I took that rejection and turned it into motivation to get on target for my car and earn in the next 4 months.

This is what I told the guy who was interviewing me at the retreat I really think the main point is that I didn’t give up. Rejection comes in many forms but I truly believe in this opportunity. I learned not to fear rejection in either sharing the opportunity or selling the products or booking parties. I never gave up and at first it was really just about earning those pearls, but now it’s about sharing this opportunity that has changed my life with other women.

I can't sleep yet

so you get another post today. I am going to sum up some points I learned from Andrea Shields at Gloria Mayfield Banks' Magical Advance. I just loved the energy this woman had and the passion for the product. She was 100% the real deal. She was not just up there blowing smoke up your red jacket, she was telling it like it was.

1. Selling the product. If you haven't facial-ed 100 faces, consider your self still in training.
2. Figure out your weaknesses and work on them. If you are bad at warm chatter - get out there and warm chatter, if you are afraid to call leads - get on the phone. You will never get over your fears until you confront them.
3. Present confidence at all times. Get the right mindset. Practice your scripts until they become natural conversation.
4. She spoke of the "Donald Trump List". She said "If Donald Trump were to give you $1 million for every name and number you write down in 2 hours, how many names would you write? How would you get those names?"
5. Work on each week individually. Stretch for 8-10 demo facials and 5 practice interviews a week.
6. You need the right goal to get passionate.
7. Think what you would need to hear in order to get referrals. What would someone have to say to you in order for you to give up some of your friends names?
8. Adapt to technology!!!!! I love this point because there are some people who refuse to adapt and are missing out on a large market.
9. You need emotion to get into motion.
10. Focus on your power start plus. Try to do 12 power start pluses in a row! That's 12 months, 30 faces a month, 15 interviews a month.
11. Track your progress.
12. If it gets rough, throw some money at the problem "offer $15 gift certificate if they can book for that week"
13. Each face should have 3 appointments, the facial, the follow-up and the interview.
14. Succeeding in Mary Kay is mathematical, not magical.
15. Create a list of your 25 dreams.
16. Create your posterboards and date them, so they can not be reused.

I wish I could just play a tape or CD of her speeches but I don't have any and I don't have that technology. You can't feel the motivation of this woman just by reading my summary of her words. I just don't do her any justice.

Wah Wahhh

So here I am thinking I am all big and bad, when my friend gently reminds me that I am recruiting great! but not selling too much. Wah Wahhh.

It's true! I need to focus on selling so I am going out tomorrow to find 2 places to put my facial boxes. I have some ideas on where I am going to put them and what the promotion will be. I need to sell more product! I am hoping that since the Holiday season is coming up I will be able to sell a lot of the fragrance inventory in gift baskets.

I also registered on the wedding site www.somdweddings.com. I am hoping that I can work out a way to get some leads through them, since I know the owner. I also sell ads for that site so I hope I can get one for a discount!

I need to get out there and get product on people's faces. I need to start selling!!!

Exciting news for me!

I'm gonna brag a little bit here. I just bronze medaled in a total of 2 days! And I have a guaranteed 1 more consultant this month! My goal is to double medal this month so here I come! Anyone who comes across this blog and is interested in joining Mary Kay, let me know!!!!!

Nora Shariff's Principles of a Great Leader

This post is in continuation of my posts on Gloria Mayfield Bank's Magical Advance. Here are Nora Shariff's words about the Principles of a Great Leader. I only wish you had heard her speak because just reading the list won't be the same.

1. Lead by example
2. Leaders are big thinkers, out of the box thinkers.
3. Use obstacles as stepping stones; destiny is not determined by obstacles but what you do when you approach them.
4. Stay away from the negative.
5. FOLLOW THE GOLDEN RULE - DO UNTO OTHERS AS YOU WANT OTHERS TO DO UNTO YOU.
6. Have a clearly defined vision and they know where they are going.
7. Can see yourself there before you get there
8. Always sees great potential in others
9. They are clear that it is an US goal, not an I goal. They include others in their vision.
10. Faith is bigger than facts.
11. When they fall down, they always get back up. DON'T QUIT!
12. People will always offend you, but it is your choice to be offended.
13. Don't settle for mediocracies.
14. They have a great attitude, love life, and see the good in every situation.
15. They are risk takers. They want the best life has to offer.
16. They are constantly looking for and realizing the importance of the right people.
17. Set Big Hairy Audacious goals.
18. Have a huge passion for goal and they role others into it.
19. Never settle
20. Leaders are ordinary people producing extraordinary results.
21. They understand the rules to the game.
22. They never blame others for their failures.
23. Always have the tools they need to win the game.
24. Losing is not an option. The goal is bigger than just you. If you lose, think of the others that will lose as well.
25. Leaders rise to the challenge.
26. A made up mind can do anything.
27. They are great at painting the picture.
28. They invest in themselves, never miss anything. If you don't show up, you'll never know what you've missed.
29. Realize your weaknesses and improve yourself.
30. DON'T allow low expectations. Great expectations = great faith!

Next post I will give some great tidbits from my favorite, Mrs. Andrea Shields!

Gloria Mayfield Banks - Magical Advance

I wish I had not postponed writing this entry. Going to the Advance this weekend was amazing. Gloria is an amazing and inspiring woman. I got to learn from some of the best such as Nora Shariff, MAGIC Senior National Sales Director, Grace Adeoye, Top Trip #1 Director for the Emerald Division, Vanessa Upkins, Top Trip Director and #3 Sales Director in Diamond Division and #13 Sales Director Nationwide, Andrea Shields. Basically I learned from the best. We also heard from many different directors and one was Independent Sales Director Alyson Guerra, who I learned so much about selling Mary Kay during the holidays (ding ding ding! My article!).

Some facts I picked up from Gloria:
1. If you want to be a Red Star or a Red Jacket, you need 1 booking a day; to earn your car, directorship or a Cadillac, you need 2 bookings a day.
2. ASK!!! It does not hurt to ask! All they can do is turn you down! When they do, they are not turning you down, they are turning down the (best) opportunity!
3. It's too easy to focus on the negative, to think small and to lack discipline.
4. Evaluate your Circle of Influence. Are you surrounded by people who will bring you up or hold you down?
5. NEVER QUIT! You never know when the next blessing is around the corner.
6. Belief is built on small successes at one time.
7. Look at your business one a weekly basis. Strategize for the next 7 days.
8. Ask yourself these questions:

1. Am I selling a good amount of product? (Thinking is hard, doing is easy)
2. Am I interviewing 3-5 people regardless a week?
3. Do I have strong people/leadership skills?
4. Am I building a brand new goal poster for each month?

9. You are in charge of recreating the passion.
10. Instant does NOT EQUAL Big!
11. If you want to be powerful, do not babysit women. Look for people who Mary Kay needs, not who need Mary Kay.

Tomorrow I will give you the things I learned from Nora Shariff, including the Principles of a Great Leader!!!

My SECOND Published Work

Well, not yet. A local women's paper asked me to write a little bit about Mary Kay and the Holiday season. When she first asked I was full of ideas, but then I made the mistake of not writing them down while the momentum was flowing. I only have to write between 300-700 words, but the task seems daunting. I am going to write about Mary Kay gift baskets and the different products.

Do people really want to hear about that? I am going to offer a customized gift basket service for my customers and offer executive service for people who need gifts for their employees. I also have these Holiday Bazaars where people are going to be able to order basic and customized baskets. I hope that this is a good way to bring in some holiday cash. I need to pay my Mom back the $400 she put into product for the bazaars first. And I would like to buy some gifts for my parents this year, unlike the last 2 years. Mary Kay is going to give me that opportunity.

So back to this whole article thing. Suddenly I have writer's block. I don't want it to sound like a sales pitch or me begging for sales. I want it to be informational. BUT I want people contacting me about buying gift baskets :) How many words is this post?

What a Magical weekend!

I spent this past weekend with the Elite Independent National Sales Director Gloria Mayfield Banks. I learned so much and am so excited to spread the knowledge, but I am too tired now to discuss. Will be back later :)