4 Warning Signs That Your New Recruit is About to Bail
May 12th, 2010 // 9:05 pm @ Holly Chantal // No Comments
We’ve all experienced the excitement and sense of accomplishment when you sign on a new recruit with your direct sales company. They may be someone that you just met at your last home party, or maybe someone that you have been following up with for months and were just waiting for them to save up enough money to buy their starter kit and join you in the business. It’s always an exciting time when someone decides to join your team, you can make new friends, earn awards, and increase your revenue. The only let down is when your new recruit quits even though you can see what great potential they have. It is important in this situation to not take your new recruit’s decision to leave direct sales personally. I’ve seen too many great team leaders get jaded and lose their love of recruiting because of those times when their recruits leave before they can even get started. While this can be a very frustrating part of direct sales and leading a team, I am going to explain a few of the warning signs to be aware of in your new recruit’s journey so that you can be prepared to help and hopefully avoid this dilemma.
1. Your new recruit starts to complain about not being able to book any parties. This is very common and I know you’ve heard it before, you may even have felt this way when you started your own direct sales business. A lot of people sign on in the height of excitement with dollar signs in their eyes and not a thought in their mind about how much work building their business is going to require. When thinking about the time commitment, most people only think about the time it takes to do a party and how many they want to do a week. They don’t take into consideration the time it takes for follow up calls and preparations. So the best way you can prepare your new recruit is to make a schedule with them right from the beginning with the times they are going to commit to building their business other than doing parties. Set them up for success by helping them create good habits from the beginning because we all know that when you put in the work calling prospects and following up with customers, the party bookings will come rolling in.
2. Your new recruit starts to miss team meetings, or never attends them to begin with. Most recruits will sign on for the financial freedom, and ability to work from home that direct sales provides, but in the end they stay because of the people they meet. Your recruit is much more likely to stick with her business if she immediately gets involved and meets other people doing the same thing. Your team meetings are crucial to getting a new recruit on track, and the over all retention of your team. In order to increase attendance at your team meetings it is important that you keep them consistent. In the Book Yourself Solid System we talk about your “always have something to invite people to offer” this is a consistent event that you hold for a few reasons, and your team meetings are no different. When you are consistent you are setting an example for your team, you’re making it easy to remember and therefore attend, and we know that when you create a habit or routine it makes a task easier to accomplish. You will also begin to establish a team culture with your meetings which can go a long way in increasing your satisfaction with your business as well as keep your team motivated and working as a cohesive group.
3. You new recruit starts to complain that they aren’t making any money. Many times even if your recruit is doing great at booking parties, you might still find that they are struggling in other aspects of your business. Sometimes team leaders take their own success for granted and assume that if your recruit is booking parties that they are automatically going to be making money. If you hear this from your recruit it is time to take action! There are many reasons why your recruit might not be making as much of a profit as they should be and if they are putting in the work to book parties you don’t want to lose them because of something that can easily be solved with a little coaching. Find out if their sales are low, or if they are just reinvesting too much money in their business. Many times new distributors get so excited about their new business that they end up spending a lot of money on marketing materials and knick knacks for their business. With some coaching you can help work through these issues with your new team member. You can give them techniques for increasing sales, go through their demo with them and look for things like a low average product price, or that they aren’t emphasizing the benefits of the larger ticket items. You can also help them create a budget for what they can reinvest into their business, or give them cheaper or free solutions for what they are trying to achieve.
4. Your new recruit stops returning your calls. Unfortunately this is the last and sometimes the final sign that you will see before your new recruit bails and there may not be a lot you can do. Chances are they have shown at least one of the first three signs listed here and you can try to save them. If your new recruit stops reaching out to you or even returning your communication my recommendation is to treat this situation much the same as you would with a hostess. Leave 3 phone messages a few days apart letting them know that you’d love to talk to them and that you’re always there to help if they need anything, as well as an email detailing the same information. Then check in once a month after that with a friendly message to see how they are doing.
The most important thing you want to keep in mind when you are working with a recruit and you see these signs is that their actions are not your responsibility. You can offer all of the support in the world, but unless your recruit takes initiative and works their business they aren’t going to be successful and that is not your fault! Be the best team leader you can be and set an example by building your business and the success of your team will follow.
Category : Blog &Featured &recruiting
