John Murphy

My story starts with me graduating high school. There was less than a month left of school and I had no idea of how I was going to make money over the summer before I started school in the fall. In my high school there is a job board where companies post openings. My friend happened to see an ad as we passed by that said, “Summer work, earn 17.50 per appointment!”

WOW!!!! 17.50!!! I’ll be RICH! Forget making 6.50 an hour at the local shoe store! I’m getting paid this summer I thought to myself!

I pull out my phone and call the number right away! They asked me some basic questions and scheduled an interview for me.

The interview happened to be on the same day as my birthday…this day would change my life forever!

The day of the interview I was pretty excited! I kept thinking how 17.50 an hour would seriously change my life. I would buy that car I always wanted. I could go on some cool vacations. I could basically call my own shots!

After school I headed straight to the interview at 4 pm. I walked into the waiting room to find out the interview was a group interview. Slowly but surely the room filled out with people looking to chase the same thing I was…17.50 an hour!

Once the room was full, a young guy walked in the room dressed in a suite and tie. Start his presentation stating that most people in this room would not quality for the position. He went in a presentation and eventually went on to explain that this was not an hourly position, but a 100% commission independent contractor position. At the time I had no idea and more importantly, I really didn’t care! All I saw in that room that day was an opportunity to make some money! That is all I cared about!

I was always a hard worker so this should be easy I thought. This was the beginning of my sales career.

Transitioning to today:

At 25 years of age, John Murphy is proof that it's not how old you are that will determine your level of success but what you do! In the course of about a year John went from a dial/closing ratio of nearly 400/1 to 14/1! In this same time he completed our Certified Marketing Consultant training program and Became a Top Producer. Ever willing to share, John reveals his moneymaking philosophy and how he puts it into action.

Of all the possible businesses, why did you choose network marketing as a business?

I chose a network marketing business over any other business because of the flexibility and personal freedom.  My other options were to start my own business, to buy a well-known franchise, or to go on my own completely and join a network marketing business again. 

In my opinion, network marketing has the lowest level of personal risk as far as time and money is concerned.  Regarding my first option, the product that I had on the drawing board was unique and I was confident no one else had the ability to produce it.  On the down side, I would have been personally responsible for all of the marketing, advertising, distribution, customer service, payroll, and product inventory. I would also have had the responsibility of designing, creating, and naming the product. With my time constraints, this was not an option.

My next option was to purchase a franchise. The appeal of a franchise is often that it has a “cookie-cutter” structure. This became more desirable than creating my own business because everything was taken care of.  I had already secured the money needed to invest in the business with an investor. However, I felt that by running a franchise, I would be “living” the business and almost too involved.  My investor wanted nothing to do with the business other than sharing the profits. So again, all of the subsequent responsibility would have been on my shoulders. The franchisee would also have required me to attend six weeks of training in a distant city.  With my current schedule, it was easy to eliminate franchising from my list of options. 

Given the criteria of my needs and desires, I knew that the decision to join a network marketing business would personally be a realistic and beneficial choice.  I had been successful in retailing and building a team before, so it seemed my decision was a no -brainier.  In terms of what was involved, I felt confident in my abilities, but I was clueless about how I could actually make network marketing work as a business. 

Was your business an "instant success" or did you experience challenges along the way?

When I first started in network marketing I had “instance success”.  I made my money back in forty-eight hours!  I sponsored my friends and family and retailed the product successfully. The problem was that I really had no clue what I was doing or how I was doing it.

Whatever I did was getting me short-term desired results but they did not last. Once I ran out of people that I personally knew and that I had credibility with, my business stopped growing. My friends were mad because they weren't having success.

I was mad because I was no longer sponsoring any new business-builders. I know now that my experience is fairly common. Many people in our industry were, or are, facing the same problems. Most of us come to the conclusion that the solution is simply having more people to contact. At the time, my sponsor did an extensive search of every lead company on the market. He found a company by the name of Leaders Club. I knew nothing about it other than the fact they sold leads.

My inductive reasoning told me to join this lead company, buy the most expensive leads, and get to work. It seemed so simple and I did just that. I purchased the most expensive leads and set to work on them. Success was sure to follow! To make a long (and expensive!) story short, I only sponsored two people. I spent countless hours calling these leads, and was out more than $600.

The road to consistently sponsoring five to ten-plus people a month was quite a struggle, but experiencing my setbacks has made me more appreciative of my achievements. The demands I faced along the way pale in comparison to the feeling of personal triumph. 

What advice would you give to someone serious about succeeding in this industry?

I would first tell anyone interested in this industry to make a decision! This decision should be to see your goals through in order to ‘get the job done’. Far too often, we find ourselves in limbo of indecisiveness.

Stuck between options, we rarely choose a clear-cut path. Throughout our lives, we are either moving forward, moving backward, or simply standing still. Moving forward should be the only choice you accept.

Without any progressive decisions, we are certainly not moving ourselves in the right direction. We must make a concerted effort to find out the truth (the good, the bad, and the ugly) in order to be successful in this business.  Intentionally or unintentionally, many people in the marketplace have a tendency to oversimplify, overlook, or be completely misinformed about what it actually takes to become successful in network marketing. It is important that we are not shortsighted!

Once we are able to define and identify what is authentic advice, we are more apt to take appropriate action toward our goals.  With the right tools, we can make the informed choice to build our business on a solid foundation of skills developed through challenging work and consistent action. Again, we each decide what direction we are moving. For me, the choice was simple! I made the decision to be successful. Without clearly defined goals and the determination to achieve them, we are distancing ourselves from our dreams.