How to Capitalize Your Business Without Money

“People will seemingly do anything for recognition. We were that way as infants and it never stops.”
- Leonie Harris

During as speaking tour of Eastern Europe I was escorted into a large hall that had once served a meeting place for the workers of nearby coal mines. On the wall of the vestibule was a long line of large golden-framed photographs of “the miners of the year.” They wore stern faces, with determination in their eyes. And I was reminded of that famous business adage, “Men will work for recognition, as well as money.”

This is not just a capitalist notion. It is not a concept that works with some groups of people and not with others. It is a principle of human nature. Psychologists teach that “recognition of peers” is one of the basic psychological necessities of life. We must have it. One way or another, we will get it.

One of the secrets to building a network is to “capitalize” your business with recognition. That is, to generously and effectively use recognition as a means for rewarding and promoting your new distributors. It’s like passing out money.

Let me explain. People will work for money, they will work for recognition. It is against the law for you to buy an offset printing press and go into your basement to produce counterfeit money. But there is not law against buying an offset printing press and going into your basement to produce recognition. You can “pay” or motivate people to work simply by the things that you say to them and do for them.

You can start by learning the names of your distributors and their families. Dale Carnegie in his classic How To Win Friends and Influence People spends a whole chapter teaching that “the most beautiful sound in the world is the sound of someone saying your name.” During presentations use lots of names.

To learn really how to give recognition to someone, you have to listen. Get your distributors talking about themselves. Ask questions. They all have something they can point to with pride. It may be their education, their profession, their home, a popular relative, somewhere they’ve traveled, some characteristic of their personality, “no one works harder than Mary,” a war record, some achievement in sports or business. Don’t give up. Everyone has something.

Grade school teachers can tell you that dealing with 20 students is easier than dealing with three. With a group there is peer pressure and that persistent desire for recognition of peers. As the leader of a growing network you are going to have the power and credibility to pass out this recognition. In this case, you will be the teacher, the arbitrator, the one in charge. Your distributors will work hard to hear their name mentioned in front of others. Some will never miss a meeting just to hear you say, “Mark over here is a banker,” or “Jim has the fastest growing group in our organization.”