Johnny was a strapping man at 6 feet 4 inches and as strong as an Olympic weightlifter. He had all the qualities that a man needs to be successful in his business, except one.
Hopefully, you don’t share his weakness.
I remember the day of September 27, 2008 as if it were yesterday. My wife Virginia and I had an appointment with Johnny at 10:15 AM in our home for an estimate to remodel our kitchen. Just like me, Johnny owned his own business and answered to no-one but himself. Right from the beginning, Johnny and I had much in common, or so I thought.
At 10:50 AM Johnny had still not arrived. My wife Virginia and I were thinking the worst. Maybe Johnny had been in a car accident. Maybe he had a family emergency with one of his five children. Maybe he was still with a customer and just lost track of time. In any event, we were worried about Johnny.
There is no question that the reason Johnny was late and his reaction to his lack of punctuality, is something that, if you ever do it, will kill your business quicker than anything else. You see, Johnny was late because one of his kids was giving him a hard time about doing her school work.
When Johnny arrived at our house just before 11:00 AM, he offered a modest apology and got right into his sales presentation as if being 45 minutes late was no big deal. Bad as our first meeting was, our whole experience with Johnny only became worst. The estimate for our new kitchen would be ready for us in 48 hours, or so we were told.
The fact is, three days after our meeting with Johnny we were still waiting for a phone call to let Virginia and I know what’s happening with our estimate. Finally, Johnny called us after five days, made some excuses and sent us our kitchen estimate to us in the mail. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Johnny didn’t get our business.
What does this story of Johnny have to do with network marketing and your home based business?
We can all agree that the world has too many Johnny’s. Too many people do not keep their word and provide excellent, not just good, customer service. This is not rocket science my fellow entrepreneurial friend. You either commit yourself to excellence or you don’t. It really is simple to say and simple to do.
It is clearly evident that what you must do to beat your competition every time is for you to make commitments and keep your word, all the time, every time no matter what it takes.