There are many ways to make money with a home party plan business. Spending gas money to go to multiple parties can be avoided. Online parties are a great way to save time and earn more money. Many consultants are hesitant to plan multiple parties due to the time constraints and commute involved. Here are some tips on holding an online party.

Party Plan Online Works – Many home party consultants are looking for flexible options in their direct sales careers. Working has been redefined with the invention of the internet. Having home internet access brings customers to any computer with online capabilities. Online parties are an easy way to have multiple opportunities to make consistent sales without leaving home.

An online party starts in much the same way as traditional parties that take place in someone’s home. Coaching the hostess to plan the party properly is important. Instead of sending out handwritten or printed invitations, invitations are sent by email. Reminder emails are sent 24 hours prior to the start of the party.
Live web conferences are a great tool to allow visitors to clearly see and hear the presentation. There are affordable web conference services available at less than $20 per month. If the current budget is low, consider having the online party with free online chat and voice services.

Check the webcam or laptop camera before the party starts. Always acknowledge all guests that are in attendance. Try to act naturally when doing the party online. Remember to ask for orders clearly and do not hesitate to ask for an upsell. This could be by purchasing an additional item at a discount if a certain dollar amount purchase is made. Ask each person in attendance if they would like to host a party. Briefly mention the benefits of being a hostess. Follow up with all party attendees to ensure they received their merchandise. Emails that are collected can be used in the future for marketing purposes.

Expanding a home party plan business always involves marketing by doing something new. Completing sales opportunities online is a great way to hold parties around the world, and branch out beyond the local community.

Consultants who use every opportunity to available to them to market their business using creative party plan techniques will have a consistent income from home. For More Information visit: www.CreateACashFlowShow.com

By: Kara Kelso

I know most of us have held our own online party, been to one, or at least read about them. Many of the materials online are general, and the average online party (for individuals) has around 5-10 guests at the most. Maybe more, maybe less, depending on several factors. But really for those that do not belong to party groups, and are holding their first party the attendance is going to be very low.

After some thought, I realized the way we are holding these parties is wrong. In a previous article we talked about stepping out of the wahm zone, and searching for your specific customers. When looking for guests for your online party, it should be no different. Instead of mass submitting party invites to wahm groups, let’s take a step back and see what should be done FIRST.

1. BUILD a newsletter – Before you have your next party or even start to plan it, set up a newsletter. This is something you should have already for your business, no matter if it’s an informational newsletter or one that lists your specials – you NEED a list of potential customers. If you haven’t started to build one, start now! I could go into detail as to HOW, but newsletters are an entirely different subject of their own.

2. USE your newsletter list – No I don’t mean take advantage of them, but I do mean send your party notices to your list. Your list is the most important, targeted sources of free advertisement you have!

3. Give good REASONS to attend – Simply saying "online party – join us" isn’t enough. Not even saying "games and prizes" is enough anymore. Get creative and have a good reason for having your party. Such as announcing a new product not released yet, giving away free items (be specific in your email!), or featuring a specific type of product on your website. Informational chats are good as well, such as one that explains what a certain non-familiar product is.

4. Make a SCHEDULE – If you have monthly parties introducing or featuring specific products, the attendance is going to be better than if you just have them at random. Weekly is the best for repeat guests, but you also do not want to burn your guests out offering them the same products. Monthly would work best, since it’s not as often but still creates that habit. Make sure you have it on the same day every month (such as the 1st, 10th, 15th…something easy to remember).

Don’t forget to get creative with your parties! With so many offering online parties today, you really need to make yourself stand out. Granted if you do follow the first two steps, you WILL have a much better response since instead of just other wahms you will have a targeted group that may not be familiar with online parties. Even still, there is always room for improvement.

Good luck with your next online party!

About the Authors: Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank are two busy wahms, and the owners of Direct Sales Helpers. Learn how you can be successful in your company by visiting: http://www.DirectSalesHelpers.com

Direct sales is a fantastic business for some people to get into. Notice I said ‘some’ and not all because this business isn’t a good fit for everyone.

But with the right training and preparation the success rate could be much higher. There are numerous reasons why so many promising superstars fail but first… the most obvious is this:

The warm market approach isn’t sustainable and here’s why:

Traditionally, direct sales has relied on consultants to sell to their friends and family through the home party plan format.

Basically you invite your friends, family, and neighbors i.e. your warm market list to your first product launch. The goal is to sell products and sponsor anyone at the party who might be interested in joining the business with you and get additional bookings.

This strategy has worked for the direct sales industry since the Tupperware and Amway days but times have changed. There are thousands of opportunities today. And with most people online to search for products and buy products there’s a lot more competition.

With that said, selling directly to consumers is a powerful way to move products. Think of Costco food demos or your grocery stores. We’re more likely to buy if we can sample and try the product in person.

The problem is – it’s challenging for direct sellers to consistently get people to attend their home parties. The warm market strategy works to some degree because your friends and family are supportive and want to help but you can’t rely on them to sustain your business.

Without leads, your business will cease to exist, especially if you have the type of business that is non-consumable i.e. home décor, jewelry, collectible items that people aren’t likely to buy on a recurring basis.

Let’s be honest here, when the good times were rolling, people were more likely to splurge but with the economy still shaky, people are cutting back. When gas prices are over $3 a gallon people are going to drive less and spend money on the necessities such as food and groceries.

That’s not to say people aren’t buying because we love to buy but the masses have become more selective on what they’re buying. There are bargains abound with retail slashing prices everywhere you go.

As a direct seller, you need to compete online, offline, with other direct sellers, and business owners. As I said, the competition is fierce but not entirely doom if…

You learn the right marketing skills. So if you’ve made it this far in my article it’s not all doom and gloom.

Hopefully the point I’m trying to make is this… there are thousands of direct sales opportunities to choose from. Do your research and think hard about the product need in the marketplace. And price points.

If it takes you the same amount of time and resources to promote a $10 product versus a $50 product earning the same 30% commission… it might be wiser to consider the higher point item.

Regardless of the type of business you choose understand that marketing and the right kind is what keeps your business growing.

Without marketing, your business will die.

So there’s nothing wrong with selling to your warm market but it only works to a degree. In today’s competitive online and offline competition, you will need to learn not only online marketing skills but incorporate as many marketing strategies as possible to build your business.

*To learn how you can start marketing your direct sales business using online marketing to generate leads get my FREE Report that tells you what you’ll need to know. Start marketing your direct sales business the RIGHT way.

*To learn how you can start generating leads, tips and techniques to start your business go to http://www.marketingdirectsales.com and get instant access to my FREE ebook that will show you how to attract prospects the RIGHT way.

Your direct sales website gives you a wider reach for your marketing that goes beyond word of mouth. Even if you have implemented all of the various techniques to drive traffic to your website, it doesn’t necessarily mean that prospects are going to call you. So let’s make it easy for them! Here are a couple of easy ways to automate your booking parties so that hostesses can book a party without ever having to contact you directly.

1. The Contact Form: This is the most basic, and probably the most used. It’s easy to implement, and if you use WordPress for as the content management system for your website then you can find many great plugins that will fit your needs. Just a few fields that include their preferred date, whether it’s a theme party or not, and special requests and you’re good to go. Hostesses hit the send button, and their request is in your inbox for follow up.

2. The Google Calendar: A great free tool from Google that if used in conjunction with the contact form, can make you just that more efficient. All you need to do is create a “party” calendar in Google and under the settings tab there is a place where you can generate an embed html code that you or your web designer can paste onto your website and show when you’re available, and when you’re already partying. The cool part is, to keep it updated all you have to do is update the calendar in your Gmail, and it instantly shows up on your website. Pair this with a contact form and prospects can actually choose which date they want and request it right then!

3. The Meeting Manager: There are many free tools out there, I personally use Tungle.me (honestly, only because the colors on the widget are purple and green). It’s great though and takes the Google Calendar idea a few steps further. Much like the Google Calendar it will sync up with either Gmail, or your desktop calendar. Except when someone requests a date they are actually putting it on your calendar right then, and all you have to do is accept. This way you don’t have to remember to update the calendar yourself, and you don’t accidentally end up with duplicate requests.

Now that you are ready to automate your booking process on your website, just remember that you still need to follow up! Website leads are never set in stone until you start the hostess coaching process. So don’t get hung up on a lead that doesn’t get back to you right away, if you have someone else that wants that date and is ready to commit. With these tools you should have more than enough leads to keep you busy!

Holly Chantal M.Ed is a Certified Book Yourself Solid Coach and direct sales expert. Rise to the top of your direct sales company. Get 7 surefire strategies that promise to attract new clients and book additional parties. Snatch up your free client magnet kit and website primer package now at http://www.hollychantal.com

We know once you have a room full of guests at your online party, getting them to play games is the easy part. While hunting for answers to your game, a guest has the chance to see some products they simply cannot do without, thus making you sales!

We also know from experience that getting the visitors to the party in the first place is like pulling teeth. We have given some ideas to increase your party and really being able to talk with your future customers in a chat room is the best. However, for those that you’ll never see in the chat room here is a way to increase some party-like sales without having to hold an actual party.

After you build your list of potential customers (and if you don’t have one – stop right here and do that FIRST. YOUR list of potential customers is your most valuable asset in business!), play a game with them via email. Announce on a Monday or even Friday (and you can test which days get the best responses) the start of a contest by email. Focus on a specific type of products like you would at your party, and set up some type of questions that can be emailed to you. Be sure to cover some good points about your products in a casual way (you know your subscribers want to get down to the contest part of this, so don’t overload them with ads!). You can set this up in any way you wish really, just as long as it’s something interactive you can do with them.

At the end of the week, send out another email with the answers (this might grab a few that didn’t participate before, or maybe got stumped and you never got an entry from). Give the details again of the products, which the answers were related to, and also be sure to announce the winner. You can possibly even give a special incentive to buy the products you featured in the contest, since many of your subscribers have been eyeing these products all week – a special might just give them the extra push to buy.

You can do variations of this, such as having weekly-featured products and instead of giving away prizes each week having a monthly drawing where those that win the weekly contests are entered in. Just as long as you are doing something other than just “weekly sales” you will stand out of the crowd and increase your sales!

Kara Kelso & Anita DeFrank, owners of DirectSalesHelpers.com strive to help women succeed in direct sales. For additional help with your direct sales business, visit http://www.directsaleshelpers.com/newsletter.html

YOUR INVITED to our Cyber Monday Online Party TONIGHT! (November 29th).  It is sure to be a ton of fun. We have consultants from the following companies participating:

• Stella & Dot
• Zamzuu
• Arbonne International
• Thirty One Gifts

This is your opportunity experience amazing products and take some time out for yourself.

Plus, it is a great opportunity to exchange ideas and make new friends. Whether you’re a Consultant, a host, or a guest, there’s a lot to enjoy at our online parties!

Monday, November 29th
9pm EST – 11pm EST

We hope to see you there!

There is limited space in each of our parties so please make sure to register and ensure your space isn’t taken.