In marketing, it is common to use words like “traffic”, “leads”, and “sales”. These are the “Big Three” of what is known as the famous “IPA”. Income producing activities.

The concept is a cold statistical way of evaluating what is going on in your business and there is no question that these are vital to your business. These are the “NUMBERS” that make your business work. They are “faceless” and have no soul or beauty to them. It is essential you “KNOW YOUR NUMBERS” to be successful in marketing.

However, the part of the business that is often overlooked is what those numbers represent. They represent people.

Traffic is how many people are exposed to your website. They are people who have walked by your storefront and peaked in the window.

Leads represent people who sign up for more information about information that they are interested in. They are those folks who “walked through the front door and asked for help.” They are looking for something they want and they think that they may possibly find it in your store.

Those leads are prospects. They are people who are now your prospective customers, people who may want to buy what you have. Your job is to show them the benefit of the products they are interested in to them.

The key to sales is “Give them what they want.” So, your job is to find out what it is they want and provide it for them.

A customer is a person who pays their hard earned money to acquire what they want. It is said, that the business starts here and it is called servicing the sale. There are many ways to do that, but mostly I think is to reinforce their decision to buy from you. That is done by always making people feel like a valuable customer, treating them as a VIP, and making sure you treat them better than the prospects who you are still trying to “sell”, and you are really treating them well anyway.

In the affiliate marketing world, and especially in the network marketing world, a large part of the benefit from the products you are selling is the potential your customers have to produce income from those products by becoming a “partner”. A large part of the value of these types of products is the money making aspect and I think that is an exciting thing.

When I wrote my book “Boredom to Brilliance” I wanted to provide a possibility for the people who bought the book also be provided a way to earn income from helping me sell it to more people. This is where my interest in affiliate marketing started and I think it is a brilliant way to spread the good word, build your income, and help others make more money as well.

The things that are standing in the way of people being able to become a successful affiliate marketer is having a product they are excited about, having people look at what you are holding in your hand, people asking for more information, and finally people being cared for enough to make them feel good about spending money on that product. This process is known as marketing and sales. You won’t make money unless people, human beings, know you, trust you and like you, and your products.

Every successful endeavor is made up of the relationships, the masterminds, and the cooperation of people with one another. Building a people-centered business is really the key to ensuring success.

You want to earn money as an affiliate marketer, but it is important not to look at your prospects and customers like the fatted cow being lead to slaughter for their meat. You want to look at them like a flower to be cultivated and cared for so they can grow and become a valuable part of your business for a long time to come.

I believe that the most important part of any business is the ability to make people feel good about their participation in your business and that can only come from a generous heart filled with goodwill towards all. Nothing makes people more at home than a gentle smile, a warm greeting, and sincere support.

The statistics of marketing and sales are people. If nothing else, you want even those who just walk past the front of your store and don’t walk in to say “That looks like a cool store with nice people inside.” The next time they walk by they may say, “Hey, I’ll go in a take a look.”

The real business is people. If you want them to care about you, you have to first care about them.