Increasing Quality of Life

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Hi There! I’m Paul Beach of www.helppeople.biz, and I have a little something I’d like to get off my chest. As always, I ask for your forgiveness if any of this gets too basic; I simply don’t wish to lose anyone in my progression of thoughts and ideas. So please, stay with me; you might just formulate a new concept of your own from entertaining my humble musings.

Life is immensely easier at this time than at any other time in recorded history – especially in America. Of the “Haves” and the “Have-nots”, even the Have-nots have a quality of life that rivals that of lords and kings just a few hundred years ago. The largest portion of the population in this country lives day to day in a sound structure with hot and cold running water, environmental controls, and electrical energy to power all kinds of fun and useful gadgets.

Who can argue this? Would anyone try to suggest that the pioneers of 150 years ago had it better because they weren’t at risk of being the victim of a drive-by shooting? Did folk’s have it better in the early 1900’s because life was “simpler” back then? When and where would you prefer to live – in a dark, drafty, fabulously ornate, castle on a hill before the days of indoor plumbing or in the simplest studio apartment available today with central heat and air?

For the world’s population as a collective entity, life is great, and it’s actually getting better everyday. Certainly, there are individuals, and large collections of population for whom life could be a lot better (the third world!), and, you know, the funny thing is, MOST people DO wish their situation could be better, regardless of how much they already have. I certainly do, and I not ashamed to admit it. Don’t you?

How is it that I could feel like I deserve more when I already have so much!! I have a fine house, vehicle, computer (less than 3% of the world’s population owns a computer), and I have access to the internet (one of mankind’s greatest achievements!) I have control of my own time, and I have my health.

From whence do all these gifts spring?

You could say God, and maybe you’d be right, but let’s be more specific.

You might suggest that government or social order makes all of this possible, and perhaps you’d be getting a little warmer, but let’s narrow it down even further.

“Science and progress”, perhaps? We’re getting even warmer. Carl Sagan had many great insights into technology and its effects on quality of life in his book A Demon Haunted World – Science as a Candle in the Dark. I think it’s safe to say that he was a leading expert on the subject. The world was vastly enriched by his existence.

Napoleon Hill, author of Think and Grow Rich, suggested that capitalism played a huge role in the increase of quality of life. For many people capitalism is as dirty a word as communism is to most Americans. If you’re one of the many people in the world whose life is made easier by the fact that you can travel to the nearby Wal-Mart (market) and give some form of currency in exchange for food and other goods, rather than having to go out and hunt and gather your own food, then you are benefiting from what Napoleon Hill referred to as capitalism. If that concept is too much for your altruistic sensibilities, then either call it something else, or stop bartering. Of course, I’m only joking!

But not really.

So, what is at the essence of this increase in quality of life? I’ll put it into five words: Produce More Than You Consume.

If we today have an abundance of resources available to the individual, it is because someone at some point put forth the work necessary to convert raw materials into tools that we could use to make life easier, more enjoyable, and longer. Throughout recorded history we have seen many examples of people that produced much, much more in their lifetime than they ever consumed.

Even today, there are many living examples of such heroes to society; people who produce more than they consume. They are the honest businessmen and entrepreneurs, from the sole hotdog vender to the mega-conglomerate car manufacturer. Their efforts carry mankind forward and result in a net increase in quality of life.

There are also those people that are the opposite – those who consume or destroy more than they produce. They are the thieves, the fraudsters, the bureaucrats, the war-mongers. Their actions lead mankind to its detriment, and result in a net decrease in quality of life.

Between these two extremes lies the spectrum wherein we all fall, and by our own contributions either carry mankind forward or push mankind down. Where do you fall in the spectrum?

Luckily, the forces of progress have been winning this tug of war, as it is obvious that the net quality of life has indeed been steadily on the rise for the last 2,500 years, probably much longer.

So life is great! And getting better everyday! And still we want more!

This is not a bad thing, though. Ambition is the drive behind the person who is able to produce more than they consume; not to be confused with greed, the motivation behind someone willing to steal or destroy in order to get what they want.

I, for one, am dedicated to improve my quality of life by producing more than I consume, and I hope that you are too. By producing more than we consume we improve our own quality of life, and we contribute to the net increase of quality of life for everyone else in the world. That’s awesome!

How does one produce more than they consume? It’s as simple as creating a product or service, and marketing that product or service competitively.

But not everyone has developed the creativity to just invent some previously unthought-of widget (product) and produce it; in fact precious few have. And not everyone has the knowledge to market their innovative widget in the vastly competitive marketplace. And so we tend to specialize, and this is a very good thing.

Think of your current vocation. It’s quite possible that you are a member of the workforce and currently employed in a job that falls somewhere in this process. Are you part of the widget creation process, the production process, or marketing?

Perhaps you are part of a growing percentage of people that are self-employed; creating, producing, and competitively marketing your own product or service. If you are, then you probably understand what I’m talking about on a fundamental level. And by the way, thank you, thank you, thank you! Society needs more heroes like you.

Now, for the purposes of my treatise, I am now going to focus a little more on the marketing. If you are like me then you are one of those individuals that have yet to discover their extraordinary new invention. But those amazing few people that do create a fantastic product or service often need people like us to help with their marketing.

What is Marketing, exactly? We’ll skip the Webster’s definition. The essence of marketing is screaming really loud! “BUY MY WIDGET!!”

Here’s an example:

There is a group of people that creates a product that they call an automobile. They aren’t alone. There are MANY automobile manufacturers, creating cars of all different styles, sizes, functions, and price-ranges. There is a huge body of individuals whose lives would be significantly enhanced by owning one of these vehicles; they simply need to be informed about which of the many vehicles will best serve their individual needs.

The makers of these cars all scream at the tops of their lungs, “Buy my Vegajuhutz-mobile! It does yada-mein shmada, and can be yours for the low price of tree-fiddy!” They do this on a large scale by employing the services of video production companies and making video and audio advertisements. Then they purchase (at great expense!) huge amounts of airtime on the television and radio which play their commercials.

This is rather costly marketing, but apparently it must be done this way in the highly competitive automobile market. And they call this conventional advertising. (Television, Radio, Periodical) The cost of this marketing is passed on to the consumer! Repeat that last sentence again if it didn’t completely sink in, and then think about how much your average car would cost if the manufacturer DIDN’T engage in such marketing tactics; most likely thousands of dollars lower than normal. Of course, would you buy a car if it didn’t have a snazzy TV commercial? Would you even know about such a car? Probably not, to both questions.

There are many other methods of marketing, but I want to focus on the oldest and least expensive method – word of mouth, today referred to as network marketing. It requires no explanation, but I do want to point out a rather contrasting aspect of the two extremes of marketing, to-wit: Conventional Advertising costs the consumer, while Network Marketing can pay the consumer.

How can network marketing pay the consumer? Well, let’s explore this method of marketing.

The first thing to remember is that, contrary to ideas from certain individuals and groups with an interest in perpetuating conventional advertising, network marketing is a perfectly legitimate form of marketing, as determined in a study done by the marketing whizzes at Harvard University some years ago. Conventional advertising is what – maybe 200 years old at the most, and it really didn’t come into its own until the creation of TV. Network Marketing has been around since the development of oral communication.

Here’s an example of network marketing:

Many years ago a group of people developed a line of cleaning products that was better than anything available on the market at that time. We’ll call them Company A. Their product was a little more costly than other brands, but far superior.

Company A could have sold their products in stores with the use of conventional advertising and probably done well, but instead they set up a program where individuals could purchase the product at a special price, then re-sell the product at a profit for themselves directly. They could also recruit others to join their down-line, and those new recruits could then purchase the product at the special price and re-sell. The recruiter would get a portion of the proceeds of all purchases made by recruits in his down-line; the more people he recruited, the more money he made. Recruits could duplicate the success of their recruiters by doing exactly what they did.

By and large, it was a good program and many people in the beginning got very wealthy in a relatively short period of time. For those people it was a happy story and that’s great, but it should be noted that for many more people it was not a happy story. Eventually, other manufacturers made cleaning products that were comparable to Company A, and more competitively priced. Company A couldn’t really compete, regardless of the marketing method they employed. From that point forward, very, very few people could get rich from network marketing for Company A.

Unfortunately, the story of Company A could stigmatize a lot of people in regards to network marketing. But once you analyze the situation, you realize that the sad experiences that so many people had with Company A weren’t the fault of network marketing as a marketing method.

In fact, it’s really an example of the purity of network marketing. Allow me to illustrate:

Let’s say that there is a real slick salesman (marketer) who has the amazing ability of “closing” anyone. Mr. Closer can make his prospects believe that they simply MUST have what he is selling. For every objection they come up with, he is ready with a clever comeback that leads his prospect inevitably to saying yes! Now, let’s say that his product is ice cubes and that his market is the Eskimo population. Mr. Closer has absolutely no problems with selling his market a product that they don’t really need, and because he is such an amazing salesman, he makes a lot of money because ice cubes are cheap to make in Alaska and there are a LOT of Eskimos. But does that mean you or I would be able to duplicate his success? I wouldn’t even want to, but that’s not even really the point.

The point is that selling ice cubes to Eskimos would NEVER work as a network marketing program. For network marketing to work the product must have real value and be competitively priced. Maybe Mr. Closer can have success selling a product with no real value with his high-pressure sales technique, but NOT you or me using network marketing. Word-of-mouth marketing is too pure to push crap onto people!

Please, before you decry me as being sorely elementary, let me just point out that there are hundreds, maybe thousands of so-called “network marketing opportunities” out there right now that do pretty much that very thing – they attempt to market a “product” that has little or no actual value, or is not competitively priced.

Which brings me to my next point – if I should decide to network market some product, what program should I enroll with?

As I said, there are thousands of companies offering network marketing programs to sign up with. Maybe you’ve seen some of these products:

Cleaning supplies

Herbs

Vitamin supplements

Diet pills

Long distance phone service

Prepaid legal service

Information

Water filters

Alarm systems

Mentoring

Discount plans

Educational materials

And that doesn’t even scratch the surface! How do you choose? I spent years looking for a program that fit all of my criteria, but I don’t want to get into that right now. If you’re observant, then you already know what I’m into, and selling you on my program is NOT what this is about.

The first thing to be aware of is that most of the network marketing programs out there probably work to some degree or another. Just about anyone could join virtually any program and with a modest amount of effort make a modest second income, maybe even some residual income. Without a doubt, some programs are better than others, so please don’t test what I just said by running out and signing up with the first business opportunity that you come across.

First, let’s talk about the product (product-line) or service being offered.

Rule #1: As I said before, the product must have a real value, and be competitively priced.

Otherwise, it’s Company A all over again.

Rule #2: The product should satisfy a hole in the market.

The easiest marketed products are always made by people who see a situation in need of improvement and say, “There ought to be a doo-hicky that fixes that problem.” Then they invent such a doo-hicky. Find a company that markets some such innovation; that way you won’t have to “create demand” for the product.

Rule #3: Preferably, it should be a product that you use and get much benefit from.

Your genuine excitement will help you sell more than any other sales technique that you can employ.

Those are just the basics for the product. Next, to save yourself a ton of grief and pain, you’ll want to do some major research on the company offering the product and opportunity. The internet is a fantastic resource for this, but be careful - it is also easy for the flimsiest of sham companies to look perfectly legitimate on a professional-looking website. One resource that I use a LOT is www.ripoffreport.com. It is a great consumer advocate website. There you can read postings of people’s experiences with certain companies, and more.

After you look as far up the company’s @$$ as you can, examine the program itself – the business organization and the compensation plan. And this is where you should ask the all-important question: Where does the money come from???

Undoubtedly, by the time you’ve looked at the product and the company, you’ll have been bombarded by hype about the opportunity. You’re going to hear fantastic stories of millionaires, multi-millionaires, people with six-figure residual incomes, and all manner of wondrous cash-flow all while lounging in a hammock in the back yard of the mansion or walking on the beach with the wife and kids.

But where does all that money come from?!

I’ll give you the simple answer: It comes directly from the people in the down-line, and from customers outside the program, if any.

This is why it is absolutely essential that the product or service in question has real value and is priced competitively. The purchase of the product or service must be a value to the customer regardless of whether that person is involved in the program or merely benefiting from the product or service. Otherwise, there will be no customers, only down-line, and all you have is a glorified gifting scheme. (Gifting schemes, for anyone not up on the lingo, are nothing more than chain letters made marginally legal by including a product to purchase, usually information, most often VALUELESS information. If you’re unsure about what a chain letter is call or e-mail me. I’ll be happy to explain it.)

OK, back to cases. Here is an exercise to run the opportunity through, to determine its value to the marketplace on a large scale. Imagine the opportunity when it hits market saturation. At that point, who is buying the product, who is taking part in the opportunity, and who is getting rich?

Here’s an example:

Company X is marketing an innovative widget that allegedly improves quality of life. It is a consumable, so the widget habit costs customers tree-fiddy every month, but this is comparable to other widgets on the market that do the same thing. The promotional hype that you’ve received from Company X includes a statistic that says 4 out of 5 people don’t have the benefit of the widget in their life. Now, let’s imagine that you sign up as a REP with Company X, and their widget truly is a great product. It sells like crazy and you make all the money that they ever promised in the hype.

At length, Company X’s widget achieves market saturation. In this case, let’s say that that means less than 1 out of 5 people do NOT purchase the widget from some company or another. By this time, are you or anyone else in your down-line signing up any new REP’s. Probably not. But your residual income is enough that you’ll never have to work again, so it doesn’t really matter, right?

Well…..

Where is the money for your residual income coming from?

The answer to this question is hugely significant; here’s why: We made a commitment to produce more than we consume, right? We made a promise to contribute to the net increase in quality of life of everybody by never stealing or destroying. For these reasons we must always remain aware of where our gold comes from.

What if I created and marketed a widget that was only good as a tool for aiding thieves. Thieves are my only market, and they, of course, purchase my widget with money that they have stolen. I’m only making a product and marketing it competitively; I’m not doing the actual stealing. Should I care that my income is derived from thieves who stole from you? The answer is ABSOLUTELY YES.

With anything we do, whether it’s through network marketing, some other business, or even our employment, we must look honestly and objectively at the business and determine where the money that appears in our pay-checks is coming from. If the source of that money is fraud (stealing made possible by the victim’s not being properly informed of all the facts) then we should seriously consider making the situation right. That’s all I’m going to say about that.

Back to Company X –

If the widget is truly a good product, then the money for your income at the point of market saturation is going to be coming from satisfied customers. And you won’t have any difficulty imagining a utopian world where nearly everyone benefits from the widget. On any opportunity you look into, if the mental picture of market saturation is not a pretty one, run away.

And here we see the fatal flaw in companies employing network marketing and the internet to sell information. I’m sorry I have to pick on these guys, but I see them as the far extreme from the companies marketing legitimately valuable products.

Just a quick example:

Company M has developed a method of high pressure sales that is highly effective. For tree-fiddy, you can purchase this method of sales and “license” to sell it to others. Using the high-pressure techniques taught to you by your up-line mentors, you sell the method to others who are now in your down-line. With the “help” of your up-line mentors, you train the people in your down-line to “close” other people just like you “closed” them; just like your up-line mentors closed you. Their efforts will ensure your residual income. It looks extremely lucrative and easy, and if you ever have illustrious opportunity to hear the pitch from someone at Company M, they’ll do everything in their power to “close” you! (that is, make you believe that you must join them at any cost!)

But –

There are several problems with it, not the least of which is the question “Where is the money for your income coming from?” Since there are no outside customers, ALL of your income comes directly from the pockets of the people in your down-line. Unless they duplicate your actions, they’ll lose and so will you. If they succeed, then that just means your money is coming from the suckers at the end who DO lose, right down to market saturation, assuming that it ever got that far. You’re making LOSER MONEY. Net quality of life in decline!

Company M’s program has other problems. For its REP’s to succeed they must “close” prospects. They have to turn a ‘no’ into a ‘yes’. Do you want to be closed? Neither do I. Do you want your income to come from people that you closed? I don’t! High-pressure sales is insulting.

Here is another problem with marketing information. Information is highly fragile. Once it hits the internet, there is NO WAY to keep it secure. It loses any value that it might have had almost instantly. What’s to stop someone from buying (or hacking!) the information, and then sharing it with everyone in the world on a Peer-to-Peer server? Ideally it would be great if everybody respected the intellectual and digital ownership rights of everyone else, but we’re just not that collectively evolved yet. It remains something to work toward.

The same thing goes for all of those ‘MAKE MONEY ON THE INTERNET WHILE YOU SLEEP’ programs. For tree-fiddy you get a turn-key “business” that allows you to ensnare others with a flashy website that describes how they can ‘make money on the internet while you sleep’! Hopefully, by now you understand the fundamental flaw in programs like these. I honestly don’t know if it works or not, but I have my doubts. Besides, if it does work, you’re making loser money, and if it doesn’t work, you’re the loser; someone else is getting money from you!

However, I must say, there is nothing wrong with earning money while you sleep, if you’re marketing a product with real value that is competitively priced.

The bottom line is this:

You’re looking for a program that markets a valuable product or service competitively. Anything less than that is quite frankly immoral and unethical because it contributes to the net decline of quality of life. Companies and people can talk all they want about integrity and honesty, and they all do, believe me! Don’t listen to what they say. Look at what they produce - Is it a valuable product? Look at their prices and program – Is it competitive with the rest of the market?

I’m reminded of the old story of a young kid that took out an ad in the back of a tabloid magazine. I MADE A TON OF MONEY! I CAN SHOW YOU HOW! SEND FIVE DOLLARS AND S.A.S.E. He had thousands of responses to all of which he sent a simple note. “Take out an ad like the one I did.”

It’s a cute and clever story, and I’m sure that the kid went onto become a marketing guru, for whatever that’s worth. But what about the net quality of life? Up or down? My guess is down, if even by an infinitesimal amount.

It was an little-known associate of P.T. Barnum that said, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” That may or may not be true, but I’ll tell you what I believe: We exploit someone else’s ignorance for money at the cost of a net decline in quality of life for everyone.

Folks, that’s all really I wanted to say. Look at where your money is coming from. Make sure that you’re not marketing to or for thieves.

Let’s do all of our network marketing by opening people up, not by “closing” them.

Increase your quality of life and contribute to the net increase of quality of life for everyone by producing more than you consume.

I appreciate you stickin’ it out to the end. Thanks for your time, and have a great day!

If you have questions or comments about any of the preceding, you can call me directly at (321) 591-4068 or e-mail me at beach@beachproductions.com

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