I'm sure all of you network-marketing experienced folks or retail-savvy entrepreneurs have, but having spent my life in non profits and charitable enterprises and non-formal education,  I hadn't.   Learning about this principle has helped me put some of the market resistance I've experienced into a better, more hopeful perspective as I've entered the world of the entrepreneur with my own small business.  Maybe it will help you, too.

The "7-to-10 rule" is basically this:  before making either a purchase or a market commitment, a customer or prospect must normally be introduced to a new product or concept 7 to 10 times.         That sounds simple enough, but as a person new to both retailing and network marketing, not knowing this has left me with a sense that I'm not doing something right when I encounter those first six (or more) rejecting, defensive, suspicious or even neutral reactions to the products I sell or to the business opportunities I offer.

What I've come to believe is that everyone who eventually turns out to be a business success encounters this, too -- but they keep going past the sixth time or the seventh or the eighth.  The really successful retailers, fundraising promoters and network marketers keep going, finding creative, friendly, winning ways to make that sixth and seventh and tenth presentation to the same person or organization without negativity and without arm-twisting.           What the "7-to-10 rule" tells me is this:  it's up to me to make my products familiar, my materials appealing and easy to understand and use and to see any pockets of resistance as temporary "no's" on my way to final "yes's."

Knowing that it's normal and to be expected where a new product or concept is concerned for it to take 7 to 10 presentations in order to make a sale or convert a user from a similar but inferior product or sign a prospect is something of a relief to me.  In my thinking, I can reframe negative or neutral response into something more like tilling soil preparing it for seed, future growth and a certain harvest.  I find that very hopeful and very, very encouraging.

I don't have to think of those first 6 to 10 "no's" or "hmmmm's" or "maybe's" or "not now's" or polite (even smiling) silences or puzzled responses as defeats in any way:  they're actually part of the process of succeeding, so long as I remain committed and persistent and open and friendly and not defeated in any way.  A new idea or item always takes some getting used to -- that's what the 7-to-10 rule states -- I just have to be available and ready with a reminder or two that the products are still there, the business opportunity is still available.

Now, if you're like me and had never heard of this rule before, it may take you 7-to-10 times thinking about this idea to have it actually sink in!   **************************************** This is a copyrighted article that may be reprinted with permission of the author and with the following byline intact:   Georgia Ana Larson is a writer/editor/entrepreneur and advocate of radical hope.  You can read more of her writing at www.aBrighterCandle.com -- and you can find a product and business opportunity she offers at   www.MyMonaVie.com/PainFreeatLast

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