Experienced top executives reveal strategies driving sales and recruitment in today’s market
By Jenna Lang Warford
“We create beautiful imagery of all of our products, and my hope is that Brand Ambassadors don’t use it but instead create their own.” —Jesse McKinney, CEO, Red Aspen
“New people account for the majority of where our new recruits are coming from.” —Brian Dill, Vice President North America, Norwex
“The challenge is, now there are so many people posting on social media, trying to get attention.” —John Melton, Top-Earning Field Leader, Founder of My Lifestyle Academy
Headlines in the direct selling channel are alarming: Quarterly sales reports are showing decreases, the Federal Trade Commission doesn’t seem to have slowed its pursuit of eradicating the multi-level compensation model and companies that seemed stable are switching to single-level affiliate compensation models.
Three questions loom large:
- What is working for the sales field regarding sales and recruiting?
- What isn’t working?
- What can executives do to support the sales field?
What’s Working Now
Beauty company Red Aspen, founded in 2017, is still growing at a rapid pace. The company was recognized in both 2022 and 2023 as an INC 5000 company and is one of the fastest-growing businesses in Idaho.
Its co-founders, sisters Jesse McKinney (CEO) and Genie Reese (chief strategy officer), together with friend Chief Operating Officer Amanda Moore are regular speakers at channel events, sharing what is creating growth for the company.
Social media has always been a strong part of Red Aspen’s field practices. The company’s strategies for field sales are designed around optimizing that for Brand Ambassadors. There are two key areas the team focuses on to produce growth, according to McKinney.
“The first is personalized content,” she says. “We create beautiful imagery of all of our products, and my hope is that Brand Ambassadors don’t use it but instead create their own. We found when we provide them with the product about a week ahead of launch, they make their own content. This works better because it’s personal to them, showcasing their own personalities.”
The other thing the company has done is eliminate the catalog cycles. “We completely ditched the catalog model, and we just have weekly, limited-time offering drops. This keeps things really fresh for the field,” McKinney says.
For Norwex, Vice President of North America Brian Dill acknowledges that the company has had to re-evaluate its strategies over the past few years. “Norwex has gone on a journey since the pandemic and what we realized is we have an amazing product, we have an amazing base of consultants, and our comp plan and everything is working just as it should.
“The overarching thing that we realized is we have to go back to who we are and we have to go back to building relationships; the relationships are the key to our business,” he adds.
“So we went back to the basics. For selling at Norwex, that’s the party plan method. Now, how that party’s done is different now. It can be in person, on Zoom, on Facebook, it can be done through texting.”
Dill is frank about the company finding effective ways to support the field in recruiting. “From a recruiting standpoint, I think like most everyone out there in our industry, the struggle’s real,”
he says.“We’ve had a good year of recruiting, but not necessarily the year that we want. And so we’re looking at how do we do things differently; how do we catch the attention of our new people? Because new people account for the majority of where our new recruits are coming from.”
Dill continues, “And then the next part is how do we keep our leaders engaged in team building? We’ve kicked around a couple things, and in September we have a couple of exciting programs that we’re going to launch, things we’ve never done before. So we’ll see how that works.”
In preparing for this new strategy, the executive team discovered that their field was concerned with analytics.
“They want to know systematically, how many parties does it take to get X amount of revenue? How many parties does it take to get X number of bookings? How many people attending does it take to get bookings? How many are asked before someone is recruited?”
Part of Norwex’s strategy was strategically working with their leaders to determine those stats.
Tony Solis, serving as interim president of Qyral and prepping for the launch of a new brand, also believes that capturing the attention of new distributors is vital in this process. He says, “I am seeing the most effective results stem from a renewed emphasis on how best to engage our newest customers and distributors.
“Companies that have a robust distributor onboarding program, which receives support and adherence from their leadership—along with providing a strong consumer experience—will tend to have an increased engagement and larger average customer order.”
John Melton, a top field leader and top earner who also runs the training company My Lifestyle Academy, says that there are two key factors for engagement, each with several components. The first is the inherent value that in-person connection offers, but that it isn’t effective if used the same way it was used even five years ago.
“There’s definitely value in the in-person events,” Melton says. “We still do in-person training; we still do team retreats. Those are obviously beneficial, but to expose people to your product or opportunity you don’t need to physically sit down with someone anymore. Most people don’t want to do that. They don’t want to invite people to their homes.”
He says another thing people don’t want to do is feel like they have to chase people or pitch to their friends and family. “That’s why most people get excited about the second thing, which is the whole lead generation conversation, building a brand and the new-age way of doing things.”
It’s required for today’s distributor, though Melton also acknowledges, “The challenge is, now there are so many people posting on social media, trying to get attention. So not only is that more competitive now, but people are a lot more sophisticated.
“People don’t just see someone post about a product or post about an opportunity and immediately express interest,” he says. “They’re skeptical, because they tried some different things and didn’t have great results; so they’re not naive when it comes to opportunities.”
What this means, Melton adds, is that while social media can be a great way to connect with new prospects, it remains important for people to master the mundane, the basics of connection, follow-up, and asking questions.
Melissa Soete, field development sales strategist and keynote speaker, has recently worked with companies such as Green Compass and Color Street and sees a trend that executives would be wise to incorporate into their strategies.
“What I see working is what has become the norm for our society. Sales representatives are selling through ‘micro-moments,’” she says. “People want to be captivated in 10 seconds or less.
“So the representatives who are doing really short Reels and Stories and making posts that really catch people’s attention are the ones getting traction. Similar to Instagram ads. They start with an image or a video, and we’re drawn in to learn more.”
One of the ways that direct sellers can draw people in quickly is by focusing on a niche market, branding themselves and narrowing their focus. “Say my market is going to be menopausal women,” Soete says.
“So everything that I post and use is geared toward them and their interests. This way, I’m getting people that are relating to what I’m sharing and I’m building that community. And then those micro-selling moments are effective because my audience is already attracted to what I’m doing.”
Much like Red Aspen doing away with the catalog cycle, Soete also suggested culling the product offering to what truly represents the brand’s priorities. “Look at all the products, make sure that the quality and the offering is really consistent across the board. For so long, people just kept adding and adding products just to have another product offering.” That diluted the brands, she says.
Narrowing down the product offerings has another bonus, Soete adds. “When our Gen Y and Gen Z people go to the site, they are focused on the product, and they’re focused on authenticity and transparency of the company. So leading with an opportunity before they know anything about the company and the product is not working for those age groups.
“Successful companies aren’t shouting about their business opportunity on their website,” she continues.
“Many of the companies that have had the greatest success didn’t do that. They focused on product, and then they offered the opportunity as people became customers. They may have had their opportunity on their website, but it was linked at the bottom. Companies can help their sales fields by doing that. Because what’s working in recruiting is gaining customers and then moving them over to become sales reps.”
As a corollary to that, Soete advises going through web copy and marketing materials and scrubbing them of words and phrases that are overused in the channel, such as “opportunity,” “right place at the right time,” and “ground floor.”
Jessica Kane, a fractional executive and developer of a network marketing-specific app for the field’s managed and customized communications, has seen first-hand that some basics are overlooked to the field’s and company’s detriment. In recent consulting gigs—such as the one she completed this summer as fractional CEO of a jewelry company—she quickly realized effective training methods have drastically shifted.
“Giving Distributors the action list to show them what to do to get the sale is the key,” Kane says. “Don’t bother with teaching them the psychology behind why we’re doing it, just concisely tell them what to Beauty company Red Aspen, founded in 2017, is still growing at a rapid pace. The company was recognized in both 2022 and 2023 as an INC 5000 company and is one of the fastest-growing businesses in Idaho.
Its co-founders, sisters Jesse McKinney (CEO) and Genie Reese (chief strategy officer), together with friend Chief Operating Officer Amanda Moore are regular speakers at channel events, sharing what is creating growth for the company.
Social media has always been a strong part of Red Aspen’s field practices. The company’s strategies for field sales are designed around optimizing that for Brand Ambassadors. There are two key areas the team focuses on to produce growth, according to McKinney.
“The first is personalized content,” she says. “We create beautiful imagery of all of our products, and my hope is that Brand Ambassadors don’t use it but instead create their own. We found when we provide them with the product about a week ahead of launch, they make their own content. This works better because it’s personal to them, showcasing their own personalities.”
The other thing the company has done is eliminate the catalog cycles. “We completely ditched the catalog model, and we just have weekly, limited-time offering drops. This keeps things really fresh for the field,” McKinney says.
For Norwex, Vice President of North America Brian Dill acknowledges that the company has had to re-evaluate its strategies over the past few years. “Norwex has gone on a journey since the pandemic and what we realized is we have an amazing product, we have an amazing base of consultants, and our comp plan and everything is working just as it should.
“The overarching thing that we realized is we have to go back to who we are and we have to go back to building relationships; the relationships are the key to our business,” he adds.
“So we went back to the basics. For selling at Norwex, that’s the party plan method. Now, how that party’s done is different now. It can be in person, on Zoom, on Facebook, it can be done through texting.”
Dill is frank about the company finding effective ways to support the field in recruiting. “From a recruiting standpoint, I think like most everyone out there in our industry, the struggle’s real,”
he says.“We’ve had a good year of recruiting, but not necessarily the year that we want. And so we’re looking at how do we do things differently; how do we catch the attention of our new people? Because new people account for the majority of where our new recruits are coming from.”
Dill continues, “And then the next part is how do we keep our leaders engaged in team building? We’ve kicked around a couple things, and in September we have a couple of exciting programs that we’re going to launch, things we’ve never done before. So we’ll see how that works.”
In preparing for this new strategy, the executive team discovered that their field was concerned with analytics.
“They want to know systematically, how many parties does it take to get X amount of revenue? How many parties does it take to get X number of bookings? How many people attending does it take to get bookings? How many are asked before someone is recruited?”
Part of Norwex’s strategy was strategically working with their leaders to determine those stats.
Tony Solis, serving as interim president of Qyral and prepping for the launch of a new brand, also believes that capturing the attention of new distributors is vital in this process. He says, “I am seeing the most effective results stem from a renewed emphasis on how best to engage our newest customers and distributors.
“Companies that have a robust distributor onboarding program, which receives support and adherence from their leadership—along with providing a strong consumer experience—will tend to have an increased engagement and larger average customer order.”
John Melton, a top field leader and top earner who also runs the training company My Lifestyle Academy, says that there are two key factors for engagement, each with several components. The first is the inherent value that in-person connection offers, but that it isn’t effective if used the same way it was used even five years ago.”
What’s Not Working
Kane adds, “Also no longer working is the idea that we must teach our sellers how to sell instead of coaching them to the actions we know that will help them get the sale.
“Another big takeaway for training is that when you’re bringing on someone new, it’s no longer OK to give them an LMS [learning management system] and put them in an app with tons of videos to learn, learn, learn because then they are no longer focused on the point, which is to take action.
“Instead of trying to teach them the ins and outs of why we’re doing it, help them with just the actions that they need that align with their goals,” Kane emphasized. “Not our goals at corporate or those of leadership, but their personal goals.”
McKinney and her team lean into the idea of micro-moments and being concise when it comes to another aspect of training as well.
“In terms of what’s not working, it’s definitely long-form training content,” she says. “We found that we have to make it bite-sized in order for the distributor to pay attention. We live in a world where an Instagram Reel is maybe six seconds, and that’s what people are looking for.”
Soete agrees. “Anything that’s long, whether it’s a long post, a long presentation, or a long Zoom call, we really have to reduce it down,” she says. “If it used to be an hour, it needs to be 15 minutes. If it was 15 minutes it needs to be cut down to five or less.”
As part of Norwex’s own management and field leader journey of discovering what works or not, Dill acknowledges, “What’s no longer working for the field is trying to do everything like everyone else, trying to jump on trends.”
Other things that aren’t working include short-term fixes that no longer even patch a problem, but instead can exacerbate it. Solis adds, “It appears that we can no longer rely heavily on high-end monthly recruiting incentives that cater only to top recruiters, nor on product discount promotions that attempt to capitalize on slow-moving products to achieve consistent month-over-month sales growth.”
How Executives Can Empower Their Field
Clear communication and adaptability are crucial for supporting the direct selling field in today’s evolving market. Executives are finding innovative ways to address challenges and empower their teams.
Addressing industry concerns head-on, Dill of Norwex emphasizes the importance of transparency. “We continue to reinforce to the field our commitment to our business model, our earning model, and our commitment to them as individuals,” he states, highlighting how clear communication can alleviate fears and build trust.
Streamlining technology is another key focus. McKinney from Red Aspen shares the company’s success in enhancing the e-commerce experience: “We recently switched our platform to Shopify, which has already shown incredible increases in our conversion rates.”
This approach not only benefits distributors but also simplifies the purchasing process for customers, demonstrating how tech improvements can drive sales, she says.
While technology is important, Solis cautions against overreliance on traditional motivational tools like Fast Start programs.
Instead, he advocates for a more personalized approach, suggesting companies “directly focus on your newest members by considering what actions can best coach, train, and motivate them to tap into their network.” This strategy emphasizes the importance of nurturing new talent to build a strong foundation for growth.
Complementing these approaches, Soete stresses the need for ongoing education in the rapidly changing world of social selling. She advises, “Make sure there is consistent training around social selling and what is currently working in that arena, updating as necessary to ensure the field knows what it needs to create success.”
This continuous learning approach keeps the sales force agile and effective in leveraging social media platforms, Soete says.
In today’s sophisticated market, authenticity is vital. Distributors should acknowledge their enthusiasm while being transparent about their expertise and product preferences. Avoiding tactics like hidden direct messages in response to social media comments can help build trust with potential customers and recruits.
Executives can empower their field by prioritizing clear communication, enhancing e-commerce experiences, focusing on new member development, and providing updated social selling training.
By blending the best of traditional commerce with direct selling’s strengths—personal connections and product passion—companies can create an environment where their field can thrive in today’s evolving marketplace. The way to accomplish this is to adapt to changing consumer behaviors while maintaining authenticity and transparency in all interactions.
Jenna Lang Warford is a Social Selling News Contributor.
