34: Pure MLM Ownership...

What's going on, everyone? This is Steve Larsen, and you're listening to Secret MLM Hacks Radio. So, here's the real mystery. How do real MLMers, like us, who didn't cheat and only bug family members and friends, who want to grow a profitable home business, how do we recruit A players into our down lines and create extra incomes, yet still have plenty of time for the rest of our lives? That's the blaring question, and this podcast will give you the answer. My name is Steve Larsen, and welcome to Secret MLM Hacks Radio. Hey, guys. Hope you're doing great. I hope the week's gone fantastic, and I hope that the rest of the day goes well for you as well. Hey. Listen. I grew up in Littleton, Colorado. It's a city just outside of Denver. I loved it. It was a lot of fun. It's a city right in between Denver and the mountains. It's kind of an outdoor playground. I loved it a lot. Growing up though, I was always kind of the kid who was trying to sell whatever knick-knack to whatever person. You know what I mean? I was like in the movie Hercules, that guy that was running around asking people if they want to buy sun dials. You know what I mean? I was that guy. I've always been trying to sell stuff. What was funny about it is I never realized that I was that kind of guy, and you probably can relate with me. I never realized that I was that kind of ... There was never that introspective moment like, "Oh my gosh. I'm that guy," you know, like, "Oh my gosh. I like sales. Oh my gosh. I like business." What was funny is when I got into college, I still had not captured this persona. I had not owned who I naturally am yet. You know? I had not owned that, and so it was weird. I was in business classes, and I was going to marketing classes, and we'd be learning all sorts of crazy formulas and all this stuff, and people would ask, and professors, and teachers, and leaders, and stuff, they'd ask, "Hey, Steven. What is it you want to do?" Deep down inside I always knew I wanted my own business. I always wanted to be able to run my own thing, but I almost ... I got my perception of what it meant to be an entrepreneur from a lot of Hollywood stories, and from a magazine articles, and from YouTube. This whole persona of what it meant to be an entrepreneur started sitting down on me. It was weird. I had a hard time accepting the fact that I wanted to be an entrepreneur, because in my mind, thank you very much, Hollywood, I was falsely believing that to be an entrepreneur it meant I had to be greedy. It meant I had to go out and I had to be this guy that was constantly wearing a nice suit. There was always a briefcase in my hand. I was walking all to a meeting always. You know what I mean? It's super ... I didn't know what it meant. All I knew was I wanted to run businesses, and I had been doing it in college. I had started several. Several of them were actually quite successful. It was actually a lot of fun, but I had a hard time telling people ... because all the other students around me, all of their goals were always like, "Hey. I'm going to go work for JP Morgan. Hey. I'm going to go work for this. Hey. I'm going to work for ...", you know, huge, huge people. They're like, "Steve, what are you going to do?" I'm like, "Well, I am going to start a business." I remember the funny looks that I always got, and I had a hard time, because I was excited to tell people, "Oh my gosh. This is what I want to do," but the reactions that I would get were so ... I don't even know what to say. They were negative almost, not negative, but it was always like, "Oh. You're that guy." You know what I mean? That was the like, "Oh. Good job. Go try it. Oh. Good job. Yeah. Oh. He's going to be an entrepreneur." You know? That was the mentality that I could tell a lot of people ... the reaction that I would get a lot of times. And so, for years, with everyone, I mean everyone, with not just friends, but family, you know, my wife, parents, I mean, anybody, anybody, those closest to me, and even myself ... I had a hard time accepting the fact that I wanted to be in business for myself. I had a very hard time saying that to people I respected most. I had a hard time owning my natural desire. That's literally the entire topic of this episode. I just wanted to ... As I've gone and this secret MLM Hacks product is about to launch here in the next little bit, as things are starting to fall in place ... I mean, I've had to become more and more clear with what it is I actually want, and I had to have learned to be okay with that, not that I wasn't okay with it, but I had a hard time telling people what I even wanted, what my goals were, because I was afraid of offending someone. I had a hard time in college telling people what I wanted, because I was afraid that people would look at me and go, "Oh my gosh. That's a greedy guy. What? You just want money?" I'm like, "Yeah. I am intentionally trying to make a lot of money. You know? And you should be too." If it's not something that you're okay stating in a food court and publicly, start checking yourself. Why are you doing what you're doing? Are there internal desires that you have that are not being consistent with what you're saying? I guarantee you that as soon as you start to put your words in your conversation and the conversation in your head and it starts to actually line up with what is inside you, oh my gosh, you guys, stuff starts falling into place for you, because you get true. You get forward. You start to tell people, "Yes. This is what I want," and you move forward, and you start going and going. You know, it's funny. There was an MLM I joined when I was in college. I didn't know what I was doing. I was trying. It was a good experience. I'm glad that I did it, but there was this MLM that I joined in college. I had a hard time admitting to people that I had joined an MLM. I wasn't willing to admit to myself or to others that I was in an MLM. Have you ever felt this? My guess is that you have. If you're on this podcast, you've probably had that feeling before. You know? There was even a different one that was local to where I was. I was not a part of it, but there was the actual headquarters for a different MLM was near where I was. If I said the name, you all would know it, so I'm not going to say it. But they came out and they started trying to tell people that they were not an MLM. It confused the crap out of all their people, like, "Wait a second. What?" "No. This is not a multilevel marketing company. This is a direct sales company." They kept trying to change the name. I started noticing that all of these people started trying to do that too, that the term MLM was almost like a swear word. I get it. I know that there are people who go make a bad name, but that's true for every industry, but masking it is you merely not owning what it is you actually want to do. Does that make sense? Okay. I went online real quick here, and I actually started looking through all the different phrases that are synonymous with MLM. What are the other things that we can call MLM without calling it MLM? Well, we could call it network marketing. It's like, okay, that's a pretty standard one. Direct sales, right? Direct selling, referral marketing. Oh. That's not MLM. Business opportunity. It's like, "What?" This one killed me. I heard this one today actually, circle of influence marketing. Circle of influence marketing? What? How much denial are you in to say that? Okay. Anyway ... I'm trying to be sensitive to this, but ... Pyramid selling. Now, that just sounds crazy. Anyway, there's a lot of friends that I had and a lot of peoples I started rubbing shoulder with. Every time I saw someone who was in an MLM, they would go out and they would start to say, "No. No. No. It's not an MLM. It's just this." Okay. By definition, by law, if it's three tiers ... If it's two tiers, that's affiliate marketing. I...