Direct Sales Consultants, Feng Shui At Your Party

Feng Shui is an Eastern philosophy that has moved West.  Basically, Feng Shui is the art and science of being in harmony with your environment.  Everything is made up of energy, which affects a direct sales consultant’s ability to generate sales at their home party.  You can use some basic Feng Shui skills to create more income in your direct sales business.

Direct Sales Home Party Training

Understanding that the consultant does not always have control of all the factors at her/his home party, your awareness of certain things can be used to create energy more conducive to a successful party. Our Speakers In The Park training call last night focused on presentation techniques.

Tips For Shows

• Always have your back supported
• Never stand in front of a mirror
• Never present in front of a door or window
• Do not stand on a mountain top

The above tips seem simple and yet at a show we often find ourselves jammed in front of the bay window, a mirror over the fireplace or in a doorway.  In every situation of your life: an interview, a restaurant, your direct sales show, a dinner party, when you can choose your spot and one spot is against a solid wall, then always grab it quickly before someone else does.  This gives you more credibility, more authority, just better energy in general.  Always have your back supported for better energy surrounding you.

Mirrors are distracting and also put forth negative energy.  Whenever possible avoid a mirror behind you.

You should always be able to see who is entering, arriving or walking in.  This is true in all cases.  An open door or window does not promote good energy for effective presentations.  Like a mirror, it is distracting to both the audience and the presenter.  Command control of the room by seeing who is arriving.

Would you like to live on the tip-top of a mountain?  In a war that may be a good place for a fort because you can see everywhere and yet it is a very vulnerable position.  Wind or a hurricane or lightning may strike at any time.  When you are presenting your home show, you do not want to feel or project vulnerability.  Try to avoid standing higher than your audience. This may happen in a situation of an outside party with a deck, or a sunken living room.

These are very basic Feng Shui tips and yet they can really impact your show tremendously.  When you walk into the next party, take a look around and evaluate the energy of the room.  If your host has the card table in front of the bay window, ask if you can move it in front of the fireplace.  Or maybe you could close the blinds.  Sometimes there is no choice, but awareness is the first step and then making the best out of every situation comes after that.

Direct Sales Presentation Training

People always listen to stories with greater interest than they do facts. Tell stories at your direct sales presentations and you will keep the attention of your audience. All sales consultants give quick tips and education to their guests at shows. The whole environment of party plan is successful because of the unique blend of product knowledge, one-on-one customer service and fun. Adding stories into your program to make the tips and information more interesting will increase the fun factor and keep the attention of the audience.

Improve Your Presentation Skills

Stories will improve your sales! One of the concepts that all professional presenters incorporate into their program is the use of pictures, parables and principles. Principles are facts, rules or knowledge. Pictures are well… you know what pictures are, they are pictures. You can include pictures by actually drawing them as many presenters do, or you can draw the picture with your story. The parable part is the story. Put them all together and pictures, parables and principles will increase sales in any environment, and your home party is no exception.

Sales Consultants Share Product Knowledge

In the home party, the “principles” are the sales consultant’s product knowledge or tips. This is the educational part of the show. But product knowledge alone will never sell the products. Most new consultants focus on product knowledge and that is a good thing, but is not the end-all of your show. You will develop more product knowledge the longer you are in business, so put focus on the other areas because pictures and parables will do more for selling your product.

Sell More At Home Show Presentations

You will sell more products at your home show when you paint pictures with stories. Think about your reasons for being in business. What are the top 20 reasons why your products are the best thing since sliced bread? Seriously, make a list!! Depending on your product line, you could have well over the required twenty.

• Skin care: Petroleum-free, hypo-allergenic, botanical-based, etc.
• Cookware: Solid anodized aluminum, non-stick, oven-safe, etc.
• Vitamins: organic, preservative-free, high antioxidants, etc.

Professional Speaking Technique

All professionals speakers use the technique of telling stories. Tell a story using your top 20 reasons why your product is the best thing since sliced bread. First, write down the 20 features that you want to focus on similar to what we did above. Then take those product features and turn them into benefits. Following that, create a story that will draw people in emotionally and paint a picture that they can relate to. Here’s an example:

• Feature/Product Knowledge: The skin care product is non-allergenic.
• Benefit: My daughter who is hypersensitive and has allergic reactions can use it.
• Picture and Parable: My freckle-faced twin daughters who burn very easily, and usually cannot spend any time out in the sun, spent all day at the beach building an enormous sand castle with their Dad and did not even get a burn.

Recruit Direct Sales And Marketing Consultants

You can apply the same concept to your organization’s direct sales recruiting efforts. Have your team create the top 20 reasons why their marketing business is the best thing since sliced bread!

• Feature: Free Trips
• Benefit: I get to take my hubby on a free vacation.
• Emotionally Charged Picture and Parable: Last year I took my husband, Jake, on an all-expense-paid vacation. We had a second honeymoon lying on the white sandy beaches of Cancun for a week… it was heaven!

Teach your team that principles, parables and pictures concept and they will become awesome presenters and will increase sales and recruiting at their home party presentations.

Party Presentation Tip

Are your home party plan sales in the dumps?
Would you like to have higher show sales at every party?

The following is a simple marketing tip that will fine tune your presentation skills and guarantee that you make more money at every direct selling party.

Home Party Business Strategy

A simple business strategy is to make your home party presentation more interesting. The easiest way to increase your party plan show average is to incorporate adjectives into your party presentation. Unique and varied adjectives will make your presentation more interesting and keep your customers focused on you. Frequently when I observe other sales consultants’ shows, I notice that they use the same word choices multiple times.

They often say something like:

• This is my favorite…
• I really like this…
• This is my favorite…
• No, I really like this…

It seems as though every consultant not only has her or his  favorite product, but also  a favorite set of words. Think about it, what do you say at your show over and over again?

Start to incorporate new adjectives into your show. Write a list of adjectives. Over the next few days listen to other people and jot down adjectives that you hear  other people using. You should be looking for cool and unique words. Listen carefully to professionals    in other business fields especially. Add the adjectives that people in finance use. What kind of descriptive terms do people in hardware use? Another place to find good adjectives is in your product catalog. The home office already put time and money into describing your products, and chances are they have a wide variety of interesting descriptions. In those descriptions, you may find  the perfect adjective to use for that item.

After you have an extensive list, start adding these to your show by linking them to specific items or pieces of information. Even if you are not yet entirely comfortable  saying the new description, just put together the list.

Marketing Your Home Party Products

You will find that it becomes easier to market your products when you are using a wide variety of descriptors.  Chances are your home office has already assembled an impressive list of adjectives in your catalog.

• A dish with the opulent French vanilla glaze
• The Rugged carry-all bag
• Unparalleled customer service
• Deluxe cheese grater
• Royalty rich burgundy satin
• Girly-girl satin undies
• Handy cuticle remover
• Seductive cinnamon aroma

Do you get the idea? Notice that all of the above adjectives are not features of the product. For example with  “stainless steel whisk, therefore it is dishwasher safe”, stainless steel is an adjective but it is also a boring feature of the whisk. You would be better off describing it as “a breeze to clean; the whisk is dishwasher  safe”. The feature of the product is usually only a good adjective if you can spin some humor into it. “This is titanium reinforced alloy” is such a ridiculous statement that you can say it and it will sound funny.  Generally, it is better to stick with adjectives that paint pictures or evoke emotions rather than features of the product.

So, now that you have a list of adjectives linked to all of your products and information, it is time to start practicing. It is OK to use the same adjective with each product at every show. Once you memorize your adjective list and use them  at several shows it will become second nature. It is a good idea to re-look at your adjectives every time a new catalog comes out. Once you do this exercise you will continue to hear new adjectives all the time to add to your arsenal. Interesting word choices will keep the attention of your guests and keep them focused on you.

Sales will increase and your shows will be more fun when the guests are more attentive to you. The Cash Flow Show program of show organization is a complete set of home party plan skills that will guarantee to double your show average.

It is good to listen to other peoples adjectives, especially those used in other industries. Let’s put together a huge list of adjectives!! Comment below and give us some of your ideas for good adjectives that you may be using or may have just thought of.

Home Party Plan Theme Shows

Your home party show must be fun for the guests. A reputation for fun shows will bring you a steady supply of bookings. If your home party bookings or your attendance are low, then you may want to consider theme shows. Depending on your product line, there are a wide variety of theme shows. There are two types. One type revolves around a product or service and the total show changes depending upon the theme. The other type is a theme that changes from the guest perspective and your presentation is always the same.

On first reading the above statement you may be confused. Let’s talk about the latter type first. Examples of theme shows that change while your presentation remains the same are: a Mexican theme, a luau theme or a pool party theme. In those themes, the decor, the food and beverage and maybe attire would change, possibly even the music, but your presentation would basically follow the same format. These are the types of theme shows that I do. I only run theme shows in January to give that month a special meaning and really nothing changes for me regarding the demo. I may change up the recipe a bit, get out my Hawaiian shirt and offer a prize for the best tropical hat or shirt, but other than that all is the same. This is an easy way to create themes and interest in booking a show. When you say at your show: “Next month I have two themes: Tropical Vacation and Margaritaville” you will create desire for booking a show with your guests.

Here are some shows that keep your regular demo routine:

Chocoholic City
Pool Party
Pajama Party (This was really fun! Everyone arrived in street clothes, changed when it was time to leave, and we all drove home in our PJs!)
Hospital Party
Disco or ’70s show
Hawaiian Luau
Tropical Vacation
Margaritaville
Mexican Fiesta
Patriotic Theme (I usually call this the Red, White and Blueberry party)
Wine and Cheese Part

Theme Parties Will Boost Party Plan Sales

A theme party will boost your sales if you focus on a product or service that has good value. A theme show that changes your whole demo is a little more complicated and needs to be thought out a little more thoroughly. A theme show should highlight your most valuable service or product. For example if you work for a cosmetic company, a theme show highlighting your anti-aging line might be called “The Fountain Of Youth”. You could call a theme show highlighting your lipstick line “The Lip Tickler”. It sounds like fun and most likely will sell many tubes of lipstick, yet may not generate as many sales as the Fountain of Youth show would. Another example would be if a kitchen tool company consultant has a Cookie Swap show. The theme show will probably sell a ton of cookie presses. But if the same company had a “Cook Once, Eat Twice” theme show highlighting the pots and pans, the sales would be a lot higher. Make sure that you create a theme show around a product or service that will generate higher sales. The inexpensive items will still sell, you just do not have to focus on them as a theme.

Seasonal Theme Shows For Party Plan Increase Bookings

Some shows with seasonal appeal may also be good for sales. Seasonality always brings a sense of urgency which is good for sales and bookings. The above-mentioned cookie show or even the wine and cheese theme may have a seasonal appeal in December that would help with bookings in a month when sales could be down. Pool parties in the summer, romance or couples parties in February, or even a men’s football party in the fall for early holiday shopping for spouses could increase party plan bookings in different seasons.

Theme shows can definitely increase bookings, so think about how you can serve the needs of your customers to create themes that would bring value to their lives and bookings to your calendar.

Theme Training For Team Building

Sales leaders can incorperate the same themes into their team training meetings and team building activities.  Sales meetings, like your show must be fun in order to get good attendance.  Try out some of these show theme at your next team meeting and use them for team building training ideas.

When I was 18 years old, I started my career in food service as a waitress. I was a good waitress because I always felt as thought I was acting, on stage every time I walked out onto the floor. I got big tips and had repeat costumers asking for me when they returned. The home show is a big stage and you are the actor. When you become good at acting by scripting your show, you will be good at getting bookings and getting invited to other homes for shows.

A script doesn’t mean you are not able to ad lib, it just means you have a plan that is designed to generate sales and get more bookings. Scripting out your “close” of the show is the best way to get more bookings.

The end of the show is the most often overlooked part, and along with the home party show open it is one of the most important parts. Like the show open when you script it out, you will have a better chance of getting the results you are looking for, which are more sales, bookings and recruits. The wrap-up should include the following:

• Product recap: This usually would be your collections or other high price items.
• A short talk on bookings: I would recommend linking this to the collections, i.e. “When you host a show you would get the whole set for half price!”
• Sharing the opportunity: This can be tied into the prize drawing slip.
• ”Thank you for coming and for inviting me to your home.” I use this as the lead-in to the prize drawing.
• Gathering of data: Whether you use a prize drawing or get this info from the receipt, it is important to get participants’ names and email addresses. I do recommend that you do a written prize drawing specific to gathering data. This gives you another opportunity to mention bookings and recruiting.
• Tell them what you want. I recommend that you actually say: “I encourage you to check yes for more information on inviting me to your home or making money and having fun with Company XYZ.”
• Tell them what is happening next. What do you want them to do? Where are you going to collect orders? What should they do next?

Whenever I visit another sales consultant’s show, I notice that the beginning and the end of the show are frequently overlooked in the planning of the presentations, and therefore are weak. The home party show opening needs to grab the attention of the audience and set the tone for the show. The show close should leave them with a call to action which includes what to do next, and an invitation to schedule a show or sign up to become a consultant. A good close will increase your home party bookings. Don’t just trail off into the sunset leaving the audience wondering if it is really over and what they should be doing next.