It’s not often I write about booking, selling and recruiting, as there are plenty of Direct Sales trainers that speak on the core elements of our business. However, as a consultant in the trenches, I must chime in about taking advantage of the biggest selling season of our year.

And it begins NOW.

One of my mentors told me that the biggest mistake we make in sales is selling “in the month for the month”. In essence, we’re skating on thin ice in our business because we’re focused on the “now” rather than planning ahead.

Direct sales coach (and also a good friend), Julie Anne Jones, made a post on her blog about getting back to business once the kids are in school. It touched a nerve with me. If you’re just now “getting started”, you’ll have to play a lot of catch up just to get your business on solid ground in time for the holidays.

If that’s the boat you’re in, here are a few tips to get you moving forward faster:

1. Get clear on your objectives. Think about what you want your holiday earnings to look like now. And as Julie said in her previous post, make a plan. So often, we get cloudy on the execution because we weren’t clear on our goals and didn’t make a suitable plan. Plan for the vacation, the new TV, the gifts for the kids – and know how many parties you need between now and then to make that happen.

2. Know your benchmarks. What’s your average show sales? What’s the average ticket per customer? How many bookings do you average per show? If you don’t know those numbers, you can’t begin to plan. Benchmark your last 6 months versus the same time period last year. For some, their averages are slipping due to local economic issues (or other issues), but for others, because competition is waning, their numbers are on the rise.

3. Commit to “a little more” than before. Getting more than you’ve had before means being willing to do things differently. Are you reaching out to new markets, spending more time creating an online marketing strategy, or making more cold calls? What are you doing above and beyond the norm to drum up new, additional business to front load your calendar?

4. Sell into next quarter. I know several consultants that are booked 90 days (or more) in advance. Yes, it’s totally possible. For my business, I rarely have a client that can book in the next two weeks because of their own scheduling conflicts. I don’t fight it. I book 4-5 weeks out and coach my hostesses, using incentives to help them keep their originally scheduled date.

If you’ve already got a full calendar, good for you. Here are some tips to make November and December your best months ever:

1. Plan a special promotion at Thanksgiving. Each year, when other people are expecting/sending Christmas cards, I’ve already touched my most valued (top 20%) hosts and customers with a Thanksgiving card. Make a memorable connection, include a special offer, and follow up with a quick phone call to see if they’re able to order or book to add to your holiday sales. It’s a unique and different way to provide value and generate business.

2. Start approaching businesses and school offices now. Many times they’re already planning their holiday gift purchases, and if you wait until November, they’ve already made up their minds. Be proactive in contacting commercial customers – sometimes they have a huge lead time for approvals on orders and holiday gifts.

3. Remember to give plenty of advanced notice on all your parties. Consider sending invitations a week earlier than normal, and follow up with a phone call. It’s a little extra work, but the payoff is tremendous.

4. Start your VIP/customer appreciation programs now – when spending is high. This encourages repeat business throughout the year – even after the holidays. They’ll already have a few stamps on their VIP cards, so they’ll be eager to get them filled!

Don’t feel compelled to do all of these strategies, just pick a few and see the improvement from last year. The important thing is to be clear, focused and take new action toward attaining your goals. I’ve had consultants on my team sell thousands more in fall just using a handful of these tips.

Internet marketers have flocked to Twitter in droves. Twitter offers a unique real time platform for Internet marketers, but many find they are getting poor results. Those poor results are usually from one or all of these three Twitter marketing mistakes.

Mistake 1 – Bombarding Twitter followers with nothing but marketing messages.

Twitter is basically a social network. If all you do is sell, sell, sell you’ll likely get poor results. Think of Twitter as a gathering or party. If you’re like that joke we see in the movies all the time, the life insurance salesman selling people right after he shakes hands with them, you are not going to get your marketing messages heard.

Take the time to get to know people. Why? Because people buy from other people they know, like, and trust. That’s an old sales adage from before there even was an Internet. If all you do is sell without getting to know people first you’ll become a Twitter outcast and no one at all will pay any attention to your Tweets.

Mistake 2 – Sending a spammy auto-follow direct message to all who follow you.

The services that have sprung up around Twitter allow you to send an auto-follow direct message, by email, easily. Many people use this function to send people to an offer page they may have. But there is one problem. You don’t know why the person who just followed you did so. It may be because you tweeted about something personal, because they live near you, or they like the same sports team as you. You can’t assume everyone that follows you might be interested in what you are selling. Get to know them first.

Use the direct messages sparingly. Usually an open @ reply inside Twitter will work for most communication. Save the direct messages for things you discover about your followers as you go along, like responses of a personal nature, solutions you can provide to a follower’s specific problems, and the like.

Mistake 3 – Treating your Twitter account like an email list.

You’ll see big marketing gurus who have 60,000 Twitter followers but only follow a handful. That’s OK if you’re Seth Godin, Joel Comm, or some other well known Internet Marketer who can send an email blast and instantly get hundreds or even thousands of followers. If not, you’re going to have to follow some other people with similar interests.

Use the Twitter search to find people with similar interests. Once you’ve followed some of those people, many will have followed you. Follow some of their followers. Many of them will follow you. Just doing this simple thing repeatedly will build up a group of people who just might actually be interested in what you have to say.

So now you know three reasons your Twitter marketing may be failing. If you avoid these three mistakes, and actually get to know your Twitter followers as people instead of dollar signs you’ll be on your way to understanding how best to use Twitter in your internet marketing.

Every business benefits from marketing and the mortgage industry has long known this fact. Mortgage companies actively participate in marketing campaigns through the use of seminars, press releases, advertisements in the media, cold calling, various lead generation tactics and by word of mouth (WOM).

The internet is widely used in mortgage marketing, most notably through the use of a mortgage website. Mortgage companies can take many different approaches to marketing, ranging from advertising early mortgage approvals, short-term loan processing, low interest rates, or bad credit mortgages.

Mortgage marketing is probably most commonly done via telemarketing. Telemarketers are employed which call people from a random list. If the person contacted is interested in a mortgage, the lead is send on to the mortgage company itself. Using what is called a hot transfer method, a call can be transferred directly to a representative of the mortgage company.

Mortgage marketing services can take many forms. Many mortgage firms hold seminars for a select group of people who are most usually real estate agents and prospective home buyers. The mortgage companies will put on a series of presentations wherein they provide an incentive for people who purchase their mortgages on the spot or within a limited number of days. This method is quite effective but of course it can only be used periodically.

Professional mortgage brokers play an important role in the world of mortgage marketing. Since banks cannot address or accept problem loans themselves in a direct manner, they allow the brokers to do the job for them. Banks maintain friendly relationships with mortgage brokers as they are their best source for marketing mortgages. The brokers take on the task of initiating and processing the loan before they turn it over to the bank. Most brokers are capable and trained to deal with all types of loans, including government mortgages. It is estimated that fifty percent of all mortgages are initiated through mortgage brokers.

Home buyers are turning to the internet more and more these days and using mortgage websites. There are many benefits to borrowers who choose use a mortgage website. The borrower gets a very quick response using the website compared to what they would get by contacting a bank directly. These websites give the customer multiple interest rate quotes from which they can review and compare rates, fees and the pros and cons of each offer.

Caitlina Fuller is a freelance writer. Professional mortgage brokers play an important role in the world of mortgage marketing. Since banks cannot address or accept problem loans themselves in a direct manner, they allow the brokers to do the job for them. Home buyers are turning to the internet more and more these days and using mortgage website.

Are you investigating MLM companies? Are you wondering do they really work? Maybe you’ve heard a lot of negative things about multi level marketing companies. Well to tell you the truth a large amount of those stories may be true. You see multi level marketing companies have been around for a long time and they no longer are effective. Now they are not scams, but almost all of them lack the training necessary to be successful and produce the income you a looking for.

Most multi level marketing companies are going to train you to buy leads, bother friends and family to join your business, hand out flyer’s, do cold calls and more that are just flat out not effective and are not what most people were expecting to be doing. One of the reasons most people join multi level marketing is to have more time freedom. Well you definitely can’t have that why you are calling people all day, handing out flyer’s, etc.

That is not the only reason people join multi level marketing companies. They also want more money. What most people don’t know is that the way multi level marketing companies compensation plan are set you do a lot of work for little pay. To make money you need a small army of people in your downline and with the lack of training you get, it is almost impossible to build a downline of 4,000 people to achieve the incomes you read about. This is exactly why people in multi level marketing companies spend more than they make and for the people that do build a small army they are very discouraged by tiny checks. These are reasons why it wouldn’t be a smart decision to join a MLM company.

What you want to look for is the new Internet business model called top tier direct marketing. In top tier direct marketing you don’t have to have an army of 4,000 people to get paid. You don’t have to wait for a monthly check to come, you get paid right away when you make a sell or get a new member. Also most top tier direct marketing companies have the Internet training you need to be successful that multi level marketing companies don’t. Also your product is very important but that is another article. Just make sure your product or service is not something someone can found in a store, a mall or the phone book. An also make sure it is rare, in high demand and is something that people would pay for even if there was no business opportunity tied to it.

So there you have it. The answer to the question, does multi level marketing companies really work and will they create the lifestyle I desire. I’ve been in a few myself at the beginning of my career and found out the hard way. I sincerely hope you received value from this article. Take care and take action.

Omari Taylor is a expert Internet Marketer who is now working with Network Marketing multi-millionaire Jay Kubassek. He loves helping entrepreneurs grow and thrive large scale businesses working from home. He would love to help you!