Create A Network Marketing Relationship Database

Network Marketing: Create A Reliable Database

It is important of having a network marketing system to reliably hold the information you need about the people who make up your network. For many years—and perhaps still for you today–the typical “system” of choice was a card-holding contraption called a Rolodex or a knockoff under some other brand name. Simple and completely no-tech, this system uses little paper cards attached to a wheel or tray that keeps them neatly in alphabetical order. It’s all manual, so you actually have to write each person’s information on a separate card. Very twentieth century! But they’re still available, and if you hate computers, this is the way to go.

A better choice—-primarily because you can store and quickly sort through a virtually unlimited volume of data—would be database or contact management software. These products are available on the shelves of most major office supply stores, as well as online, direct from software vendors via the Internet.

High-tech? No-tech? Whatever works. Choose the system that’s best for you. You just need a way to maintain contact information on your clients, prospects, vendors, word-of-mouth marketing team members, and anyone else whose path you hope to cross again—especially those people who are most likely to be able to refer you business.

Network Marketing: It’s All In The Details

You need to keep more than just contact information, though. Your network marketing database is the place for you to record every word-of-mouth referral that you receive from your network. You’ll want to record who gave you the referral, how it developed, and whether it lead to any further business. You will also want to record what you had to do to turn that referral into a client.

Within your network marketing database, keep track of:

• how specific people help you,
• what you do for them,
• how often you meet with them,
• who they want to meet, and
• other significant information that will give you a reason to connect with them (e.g., birthdays, anniversaries, names of children and significant others—whatever they share with you that you want to recall later).

There are many excellent programs available to accomplish this network marketing strategy. One of the best known and most effective, in my opinion, is ACT! (Sage Software). It lets you record detailed pros­pect and customer information for almost any business, small or large, including notes, history, customer communications, contact records, and other features that can be used throughout the net­working and sales process. This is a good network marketing database software system.

A contact database only stores contacts, and although it may be low-tech, it serves its purpose. More advanced software can go a few steps further by not only storing the contacts but sorting and classifying them for ease of use.

Hope that these tips are helpful in expanding your network marketing business.