Are you missing out on bookings?

For my entire first year in direct sales, I missed many opportunities to get bookings at my parties… With this article, I want to save you from making the same mistakes as I did!

Assumptions can cost you bookings

The big mistake I made was that I made an assumption. I assumed that someone would only want to book a party or event to qualify for free and discounted products.

This led me to only focus on this when promoting future bookings.

Later I realized that I was missing out on a huge opportunity. There are lots of people who aren’t only interested in the host rewards. For many people, the host rewards are a nice extra but not their main reason for booking.

It took me a while to learn that many hosts book for fun, the connections, or simply because they like you.

Connection & Themes Are Key

When I started to relax more, connect better with the guests, and talk about all the reasons for having a party, my business exploded.

Some of the things you might want to highlight when talking about bookings are the opportunity to catch up with friends, how easy it is to shop for gifts (especially around Christmas), and the different themes you offer.

You do offer themed parties or events, right?

One of the best things I ever did for my business was to start offering distinctly themed events and parties. The more thematic your parties are, the better. You’ll get more repeat business, and guests will enjoy coming to party after party because each one is different.

Offering themes also helps you to cater to a variety of different interests and personality types, which expands the appeal of your business.

Don’t be a product dumper

Avoid being a “product dumper” – don’t show every single product at every party. You want to keep something up your sleeve for different themes. You want people to return to you repeatedly, and if you show all you’ve got at a party, there’s no reason to return. Well, other than the host rewards, that is!

Get even more bookings from parties

The better you become at securing bookings from parties, the faster your business will grow and the easier it will be.

And suppose you don’t have wild dreams of becoming a hugely successful businesswoman, but you want your direct selling business to supplement your family’s income consistently. In that case, it’s super helpful to keep your business ticking over efficiently by securing new bookings at every party.

Why am I giving you so many ideas?

Different strategies work for different personality types. You don’t always know what will work for you (with your personality, company, and products). So keep trying out new ideas until you find a few techniques that work well for you. Then get really good at those!

Don’t stop once you’ve found one thing that works for you. For example, you want to mix it up so that guests who’ve seen you at one party won’t get bored with you. If you work through the same “script” every time, you’ll bore the pants of people who’ve seen you at multiple parties. Also, when you present the hosting opportunity in a new way, you may resonate with someone who didn’t respond before.

So that’s why I like to give you as many ideas to try as I can.

Bribery Basket

This method is a fun and exciting way to entice guests to book a party. I take a pretty basket with a good range of different products (wine, chocolates, candles, etc.). Anyone who books a party within the next few weeks can choose a product from the basket. This is one of my most popular booking enticements. Some of my regular hosts actually ask me to bring the basket to their party.

Deal or No Deal

This method is a great way to turn the subject of bookings into a game. I use two different versions:

Put six pretty boxes on display. Three contain an instant gift, and 3 include a gift AND a party booking. So they have a 50% chance of getting a booking with their prize. Anyone who’d like to can pick a box and open it.

This game is a lot of fun, and I find that anyone willing to try their luck on an envelope or box usually goes ahead to book a party whether they “win” one or not.

The trick to making this game work well for you is to pay a lot of attention to the presentation. The prettier the boxes or envelopes are, the more guests want to open them.

Pay the Date

This strategy will front-load your month with plenty of parties. People who book a party can are offered a special price.
For example, you can offer them a special product at the price of the calendar date. So if they book on the 1st of the month, they pay $1. Booking on the 10th will cost them $10.

Many of my booking strategies or recruitment strategies use product incentives. The way I make this work for me is by using every opportunity at my disposal for free or cheap products.

Many direct sales companies offer opportunities to win products or get extra discounts on products. I use these opportunities to get some high-value items for Pay the Date, and I also get a range of low-to-medium value items for Deal or No Deal.

Keep your incentives in mind when you have an opportunity to get free or cheap products.

Have fun with these strategies. I’d love to hear which you have tried!

Festive Booking Ideas

The ‘silly season’ is rapidly coming closer! And as a direct seller you’ll want to make the most of this peak trade period.

You’ll want to party, party, party – so you need bookings, bookings, bookings.

Here are 5 festive and fun ideas to get those bookings now:

Crack a Cracker

Buy some cheap bon-bons or Christmas crackers. Create small pieces of paper and write the description of a prize on it (a product, a discount, free delivery, chocolate prize, etc.). Anyone who books a party with you, gets to ‘crack a cracker’ to see what their prize is.

It’s a festive way to incentivize bookings and gets people in the Christmas spirit already.

Advent Calendar

Buy an advent calendar with little drawers or pouches so that you can put little notes inside them.

Mark the dates on the calendar that you still have available (use a sticker or ribbon). When a party guest books a party they get to open the drawer or pouch to see what their prize is.

This strategy creates a sense of scarcity because there are only so many dates open for them to book a party in a very visible way. Also, you get to control which dates you want to be running parties or events.

I use the advent calendar for November and December party bookings!

Mini Christmas Tree and Baubles

You can take a mini Christmas tree to your parties from the start of November. Prepare a bunch of little baubles by writing an available party date on each of them with permanent marker. Put the baubles in the tree and make it part of your display.

Once a guest has booked a party, they find the corresponding bauble on the tree and trade it for a prize.

The Great Bauble Smash

Find some Christmas baubles that let you take the top off easily. Prepare a bunch of small pieces of paper with prizes written on them. Roll up the papers and put one in each bauble. Put the top back on and write your available party dates on the baubles with a permanent marker (one date per bauble).

Put the baubles in a pretty basket or box to display. When a guest books a party, they get to smash the bauble with their party date on it to find their prize.

I recommend using plastic baubles because the mess is a little easier to deal with. Also, bring a towel with you so you can put the bauble on the towel for them to smash and easily remove the mess.

12 Days of Christmas

Choose 12 prizes and wrap them as beautiful Christmas gifts. The more enticing they look, the better this will work. You use these gifts for your last 12 party dates before Christmas.

When a guest books a party with you at one of those dates, she gets to choose one of the gifts. You write her name on the gift tag but don’t give it to her yet. You present her with the gift at her party so that her guests get to see that she gets this beautiful gift for booking a party.

This incentive is not only very ‘Christmassy’ it also creates a genuine sense of scarcity because you only have the 12 gifts for the 12 last party dates before Christmas.

These are some of my favorites for the Christmas season. I’d love to hear how you encourage bookings at this time of year…leave a comment below!

7 Ways to Turbo Charge Your Direct Sales Business

Is your direct sales business in a bit of a slump? Is your account about to be closed? Or perhaps you’re restarting after a pause? Or maybe you’re going for a big hairy goal?

Then you’ve come to the right place: I’ve got 7 ways to boost your party plan biz without posting desperate pleas on Facebook (“Please order something from me before my account gets closed…”) and without annoying family and friends (“Mum….can you host another party for me….please…“).

Of course you could also use these ideas to level up your thriving business and expand into new circles, pick up some more orders, and generally turbo-charge your direct selling business.

I recommend you use several of these ideas at the same time because not all these ideas will work for all of you. It’s a bit like fishing, you’ll have to try different baits and lures and see what you’ll catch in your local pond.

7 ideas to turbo-charge your direct sales business without annoying your friends and family

1.) Market, Fete, or Event
Check what’s happening in your local area. Are there any markets or fetes you can book a site at to promote your business? This can be a great way to spread the word about what you offer and pick up new bookings.

2.) Letterbox Drops
Do a letter box drop in your local area. Create a special promotion for party bookings or orders and staple a bright flyer to your catalog. When you’re planning your letterbox drop, consider the ‘rule’ that it’s better to target the same house three times than to deliver as many catalogs as you can because people need to see something more than once before they take action.

For example, if you can afford 60 catalogs or flyers, deliver them to the same 20 houses over a ten day period rather than to 60 houses. Apparently, the first time creates awareness, the second time people see your flyer they might have an intention to act but the third time they see it they’ll act. I’ve definitely achieved better results following this method but overall my results from letterbox drops have been mixed. Sometimes it’s worked well and other times I had no phone calls at all.

3.) Posters
In most neighborhoods you can find some place to put up a poster to advertise your business. I use posters with tear-off tabs with my contact details. Put at least 5 posters in different locations such as your local library, university, café, laundromat, supermarket, lunch rooms at large offices, community notice boards, etc. Don’t forget to check back and replace posters if needed. This is a great low-effort method.

4.) Party Swap
Arrange a party swap with a consultant or distributor from another party plan. This of course means you’ll be hosting a party for another company and they’ll be hosting a party for you. It’s a fun way to get a booking as you’ll have an evening of fun with your friends and you’ll have a chance to watch another consultant at work and see if you can pick up some ideas from them.

Consultants make great party hosts because they understand how it all works and how to make it fun and successful. They are often eager to help a sister out too!

5.) Neighborhood Catch Up/Get to Know You
Host your own party at your house for your neighbors. If you don’t know your neighbors that well, you can make it a ‘get to know you’ party or if you’re more familiar with them it can be a ‘catch up’ party. Make it fun, casual with plenty of time to chat.

6.) Email Newsletter
Start gathering customer email addresses to send them updates. You can let them know about sales and special offers, new catalogs, new party themes, and new products.

You can use a free email service like Mailchimp to create beautiful emails and you’ll also be able to see who opens their emails and who doesn’t. It might be a small percentage of people that take action from the emails, but as your list grows you’ll pick up some orders, bookings, and maybe even new team members. Remember, don’t send emails without permission, you don’t want to be a spammer.

7.) Business Box
If you have some spare products or testers that are just gathering dust at home, put them together in a nice box or basket and drop it at a business in your local area. Make sure to include some catalogs, order forms, and host offers for parties. It’s a good idea to have a special gift or incentive to bribe someone to be ‘in charge’ of the box at the business (eg. the receptionist). Leave the box at the business for a few days and then retrieve your box or basket and any orders.

What would you add to this list? Have you been in a bit of a slump or on pause and had to restart? What did you do?

Bonus Idea: Train Your Brain for Success

Positive Prime is an amazing app with new technology based on the latest research in neuroscience and positive psychology. The app is a bit like Netflix for your brain meets a vision board on steroids! If you want to turbo-charge your motivation, creativity and drive, then check out Positive Prime to help you do that. You can read more about it here.

2 Tips for Your Launch

Have you started your direct sales journey? Or are you resuming your journey after a break?

I’ve got 2 tips for you on (re-) launching your business and common mistakes that you want to avoid.

And if you’re a leader, you might consider teaching this strategies to your newbies, just like I do.

The first tip relates to how to promote your new adventure (and how not to do it) and the second tip is about how you get your very first parties filled.

DO: Shout it from the rooftops!
You’ll want to announce your new business online. You’ll want a business Facebook page, Instagram account, Twitter account…whichever social media is ‘home’ for you.

But your new business account is pretty empty when you first start out. So, start with announcing your new adventure on your personal social media profiles.

A really great way to grab people’s attention and show your enthusiasm for your new business is by doing a Facebook /Instagram Live of unboxing your starter kit. It won’t take long and isn’t difficult, but it’s a very effective way to show how excited you are and what kind of products you’ll be selling.

You can then follow up with a link to your business page, of course!

DON’T: Spam your friends
A common mistake is that new consultants announce in a text status update that they’ve joined a direct sales business. Boring. Then they’ll add something like “contact me if you want to book a party”. That’s not very interesting, enthusiastic, or personal. It also just doesn’t work.

To make matters worse, they’ll then spam their personal feed with endless product photos. And they wonder why nobody is buying or booking except their Mum (bless Mum!)

Avoid this pitfall by reading this article on how to market online without being spammy, and then grab this free list of 50 social media post ideas. For bonus points, set-up an exclusive group for customers so you can start your social media marketing properly.

Launching your direct selling business? Here's how to announce it properly and how to get those first parties. #DirectSales #PartyPlan

DO: Set party dates for two personal parties
Set two dates within 3 days of each other (for example a Thursday night and a Saturday afternoon in the same week). By hosting your own two parties, you can take advantage of any host rewards and expand your kit quickly. It will also help you to achieve any starter incentives, if your company offers any.

How you approach the invitation can make a huge difference in the start of your business.

Here’s the secret: your number one aim when talking to family and friends is to get hosts. Filling your own two parties is secondary.

This is how you approach it:

Ask for help. Tell them how excited you are about your new business but that you really need their help to get the business started.

Tell them you’re looking for 2 parties in the next few weeks. (If you can secure more than 2 bookings from your friends and family, that’s fantastic but aim for at least 2).

Try to get your bookings within the first three to four weeks so you can build momentum and confidence quickly.

Anybody who isn’t interested in hosting their own party can be invited to one of your two parties. This is why you have your dates set already: you want this to be a smooth conversation where you ask them to host a party for you but you have a backup option where they can help you by being a guest at one of your parties. And you have 2 dates so that they’re more likely to be able to attend one of them!

Now, if they can’t host a party or attend your party as a guest, ask them if you can send them a catalog.

DON’T Start with the catalog option
Many new consultants are a bit nervous at first and make the mistake of starting the conversation by offering their catalog and then try to “upsell” to hosting a party.

But it’s much more effective to start with the biggest ask of hosting a party for you, then you can “downgrade” to the guest option and finally the catalog option.

Most people will want to help you and they don’t like saying “no” to you. They’re bound to say “yes” to at least one of your offers! But if you’ve already offered them the easy option of the catalog and they said “yes” to that, they won’t feel they need to say “yes” to anything else you’re offering them!

There are many more tips and ideas for new consultants that I could share, but I don’t want to overwhelm you.

If you implement the two tips above (and avoid the pitfalls) you’ll make a great start of it. Then continue to learn and grow!

If you want to continue reading today, I recommend these 3 articles:

Get bookings from parties

Once you have been booked for a direct sales party, how do you keep the ball rolling? How do you get new party bookings from that party? And then from those parties?

Learning how to consistently get bookings from your parties will keep your business moving forward.

Early in my own direct selling career I decided I had to become very good at getting bookings from parties. The reason for this decision is actually a confession: I found it quite hard to get bookings in other ways!

By becoming really good at getting bookings from parties, I avoided having to make phone calls, which I found nerve wracking. Although I have long overcome those nerves, the skill to secure bookings from a party is super helpful.

So here are 4 tips to keep your diary full by getting more bookings at direct sales parties or events.

Booking Box / Rewards Display
Try to always create an attractive display of host rewards. I create a display with product rewards most of my hosts achieve at an average party. I put these products in a beautiful box and display it as an attractive gift.

Not only is it very enticing for people considering booking their own party, it also helps me when I forget to talk about host rewards. Someone in the party would inevitably ask about the beautiful gift box on display…

In fact, you can use that as a bit of a strategy. I don’t mention host rewards but at some point I ask the guests: “Who’s wondering about that box…” and then explain what’s in the box and how they can get this box for themselves.

Another variation is to add a sign to your beautiful display with something like “Get Me For Free” or “Save 30% On All This” depending on the type of rewards your company offers.

Party Bags
This is an idea I adapted from a tip in Mary Christensen’s book Be a Party Plan Superstar. I take 3 bright and pretty gift bags and matching colored tissue paper. In the bag I put my host pack (catalogs, invites, order forms, etc. ) as well as a little prize (usually a small product and/or samples) and a chocolate. I put the tissue paper on top so it peeps out and looks enticing.

During the party I will mention a few times that the person who books their own party with me will get to take their very own party bag home as a gift. I regularly have people jump up to grab a bag they’ve had their eye on because they look intriguing and enticing.

Sometimes I put little notes on the front of a bag with “Free Shopping Spree” or “More Fun” or “Pick Me“.

It’s not unusual that all 3 bags are taken during a party!

Star Dates
This is a strategy to help you not only secure extra bookings but also make sure the bookings are in your diary where you want them. I want bookings within 3 weeks to keep momentum in my business and to reduce cancellations.

Side note: if you book too far in advance, the hosts lose excitement and are more likely to cancel their booking with you. If the booking is in the near future, the host remains excited and likely to take action to organize their own party quickly, rather than forgetting about it.

To create Star Dates, print off a calendar for the month. Put star stickers on the dates you are seeking bookings. Try to have a variety of dates and days of the week for hosts to choose from. If someone books on a Star Date, they get a little gift.

I use very simple gifts but make them look very enticing. You can wrap up an inexpensive product with a small bottle of wine, chocolate or something like that. Use some cellophane and pretty ribbons to make it look attractive. I usually have 5 or 6 different gifts to choose from so there’s always something that appeals to potential hosts.

Wish Lists
At the start of your party, offer every guest a wish list and a catalog. I encourage them to write down the products they like and are considering purchasing as we go through the demonstration. At the end of the party when they put in their actual order, it gives me an opportunity to suggest that people with long wish lists host their own party to qualify for host rewards. I explain that hosting their own party is a great way to get free or discounted products.

These are 4 of my strategies. They work well for me and can work well for you too. As with every tip, you have to make it suit your company, your personal style and the event. Which one will you try at your next party?