Affiliate since: 05/03/2002, Power Rank: 44 | Read Mar's 582 other Ask SC answers

Building your downline is applying the core principle of SFI which is duplication. Therefore it is very important to adhere to this principle to be successful in your SFI business.

During the process of duplication, there are common pitfalls to avoid in building your downlines. Here are some of them:

- Never pressure your PSAs to place a Standing Order (SO). For new affiliates SFI has put a system in place in reminding them about SO.

- Don’t send unnecessary messages. Communication is important within your team but don’t bombard them. As a Team Leader, be an example to them and don’t teach your experience to your downlines all at once. Be creative, divide it in modules and make it simple.

- In expanding your downlines, it’s good to be passionate in leading your affiliates but be patient when the growth of your team seems to be slow. It might be that some people take time to understand and apply what you’re teaching to them. You need to be up-to-date in regards to knowledge base and skills of your affiliates.

- Don’t be discouraged when most of your downlines are inactive. Don’t let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. You can’t force affiliates who just signed up and do nothing or affiliates who stopped logging in to follow you. You need to move on, look forward.

Are you willing to do what it takes to achieve your goals? Successful people have a high willingness to learn and do whatever it takes to be on the path of success.

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Building your downline is applying the core principle of SFI which is duplication. Therefore it is very important to adhere to this principle to be successful in your SFI business.

During the process of duplication, there are common pitfalls to avoid in building your downlines. Here are some of them:

- Never pressure your PSAs to place a Standing Order (SO). For new affiliates SFI has put a system in place in reminding them about SO.

- Don’t send unnecessary messages.
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Affiliate since: 05/07/2013, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Paul's 35 other Ask SC answers

This is a great and important question to ask, because in the SFI "family" you can learn from other Affiliate's mistakes. This is what I have seen as epic failures:

1. If you sponsor Affiliates by purchase: Do not take on more that you can handle in one purchase. Every Affiliate may have a question that is different from the next. You will end up with many e-mails all at once, and to keep the affiliate interested in the business, you need to answer messages within a reasonable time, and you need to look at their VersaPoint Ledgers daily to identify where they are falling short, and coach and guide them individually. Rather set your monthly goals accordingly and be able to help and assist every individual.

2. Never ever get mad or irritated if an Affiliate do not understand what you are saying, or does not respond to your messages. This will just rune the trust in you as a Sponsor and Leader.

3. Never place a "demand" to an affiliate. The first objectives are to coach, guide and assist in order to build a relation of respect and trust.

4. Remember that some Affiliates will never be really active. Understand and respect this. If you push too hard they will simply "opt out". If you keep encouraging them, they might return at a later stage and be very productive.

5.THE GOLDEN RULE: ALWAYS BE HONEST! Do not lie to an Affiliate about your income, what you know, what you do not know...or anything else.

The objective should always be to build a relationship with the affiliates you have, than getting large numbers of affiliates. Doing this wrong, may get you a "top enroller badge", but you will lose all the way on activity, and you will become more frustrated by trying to control a vicious cycle that you have created yourself.

Be patient. Be honest. Build a winning relationship.

Hope this help you or someone out there....
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This is a great and important question to ask, because in the SFI "family" you can learn from other Affiliate's mistakes. This is what I have seen as epic failures:

1. If you sponsor Affiliates by purchase: Do not take on more that you can handle in one purchase. Every Affiliate may have a question that is different from the next. You will end up with many e-mails all at once, and to keep the affiliate interested in the business, you need to answer messages within a reasonable
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Affiliate since: 10/26/2010, Power Rank: 277 | Read Kay's 289 other Ask SC answers

From the very first moment that you have contact with your new PSA, you must be on your toes. Do your first messages to him contain many words that are defined by SFI and found in its glossary? A new PSA may be turned off by your letter if he can not understand what it all means and at that point doesn't even know that there is a glossary. Do not forget to revise your welcome letters often as you grow and better understand SFI. This includes both the letter you send out on your private email and the letter that SFI sends out for you. You will find that letter at the bottom of his profile page when he first gets in.

Do not delay any of your messages to him, neither the welcome messages, the weekly group letters, not the answers to his questions.

Don't talk down to him, but also don't assume that he is understanding what he is reading. Assure him that you are the first place to go to when he has a question. This way you will know how he is doing and you can make sure that he is not asking someone else who may not understand it himself but who is very willing to offer his take on it.

Do not do his work for him and do not give him rewards for doing what he should be doing anyway. I'm not saying that you should not reward him for reaching a few milestones, but do not reward so often that he depends on your payouts as part of his income.

In the same line, do not give and keep giving money so he can make purchases and make his goals. Instead, teach him how to manage the money he already has or how to make some pocket change so that he can buy what he needs to buy from TripleClicks.

Always teach him to look for solutions instead of hiding under excuses. Many people have been battered in life so much that they fail to see any solutions. It is our job, even when we ourselves are under attack, to help our PSA to have hope in this world and to do all he can do to arrive at success.

As your group enlarges, you will need to use the NOTES section on his Profile page to keep track of what you said to him and when.

Avoid spending too much time on the sleepers, but keep mailing the group letters to them.

Do not sponsor so many people at the same time that you can not take care of them the way you need to do it.
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From the very first moment that you have contact with your new PSA, you must be on your toes. Do your first messages to him contain many words that are defined by SFI and found in its glossary? A new PSA may be turned off by your letter if he can not understand what it all means and at that point doesn't even know that there is a glossary. Do not forget to revise your welcome letters often as you grow and better understand SFI. This includes both the letter you send out on your private email and
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Affiliate since: 05/05/2004, Power Rank: 916 | Read Robertson's 212 other Ask SC answers

There are common mistakes affiliates make in the process of building up their downline. Affiliates should avoid the following mistakes:

FAILURE TO ADHERE TO GOALS SET
These are goal setting guidelines to follow as part of the TO-DO List. Affiliates should try to adhere to these goals, measure progress, and take corrective action for deviations.

GET-RICH-QUICK
SFI is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Affiliates should get rid of that get-rich-quick mentality. It takes commitment, time, effort and learning to build up your SFI business.

FAILURE TO UNDERSTAND THE BASICS
New affiliates should first focus on the three core areas namely “START”, “SFI BASICS” and “LAUNCHPAD”. These are the fundamental SFI building blocks and after understanding the fundamentals it is easier to make further progress.

FAILURE TO TRAIN YOUR PSAs
Team Leaders should make it a point to train their PSAs in all aspects of SFI business so that they can be independent in the long run.

FAILURE TO DUPLICATE
Duplication is the key to building up your SFI business. Affiliates should emphasize the duplication aspects to their downline in order to grow their business.

FAILURE TO EXPAND ON THEIR KNOWLEDGE
SFI has a library of resources to help affiliates build up their business. Gaining knowledge and learning should be a continuous process.

FAILURE TO SEARCH FOR ANSWERS
Answers to most questions can easily be found within SFI resources if affiliates make an attempt to search. These answers can be found at the forum, ASK SC, FAQs, Search Bar etc.

FAILURE TO SUPPORT THEIR PSAs
Some new affiliates don’t get the needed support by their sponsors. Sponsors should be better equipped themselves to provide quick answers to their PSAs. Language should not be a barrier as translation is easily available.



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There are common mistakes affiliates make in the process of building up their downline. Affiliates should avoid the following mistakes:

FAILURE TO ADHERE TO GOALS SET
These are goal setting guidelines to follow as part of the TO-DO List. Affiliates should try to adhere to these goals, measure progress, and take corrective action for deviations.

GET-RICH-QUICK
SFI is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Affiliates should get rid of that get-rich-quick mentality. It takes commitment,
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Affiliate since: 01/13/2006, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Michael's 101 other Ask SC answers

Hello Vladimir
The most 'common' mistakes to avoid are:

+ Failing to realise that the people who join your team ARE REAL PEOPLE

+ Not sending a friendly welcome letter to your new Personally Sponsored Affiliates (PSAs)

+ Not answering questions or ignoring the concerns of your PSAs

+ Not giving recognition of achievement to your PSAs

+ Giving up on your PSAs who do not get started immediately

+ Failing to 'Work With The Workers' and spending too much time 'Working FOR the NON-Workers'

+ Not helping them build their own team of affiliates

+ Becoming discouraged yourself because only a small percentage of people who join your team take any action

When you are building your team of affiliates avoid the above mistakes and you are sure to find some workers amongst the people who join you in the SFI business. When you find them work with them, support and recognise them as people who are looking for the same as you. An online income from their own business.


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Hello Vladimir
The most 'common' mistakes to avoid are:

+ Failing to realise that the people who join your team ARE REAL PEOPLE

+ Not sending a friendly welcome letter to your new Personally Sponsored Affiliates (PSAs)

+ Not answering questions or ignoring the concerns of your PSAs

+ Not giving recognition of achievement to your PSAs

+ Giving up on your PSAs who do not get started immediately

+ Failing to 'Work With The Workers'
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Affiliate since: 02/28/2014, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Janice's 1 other Ask SC answers

Hi Vladimir,
There are mistakes that you will make are they common or not so common. The important thing is to recognize a mistake by it's impact on your downline. did a post that was written to your downline make movers stop moving because it was condescending or demanding. Did a Team Leader not write to their affiliates PSA and CSA within those crucial 24 hours.

They are the back bone of our business and future leaders in our downlines. But remember everyone enters equally but not everyone works equally so it may not be the result of any mistake being made but lies with each person.

Stay in contact to encourage and support maybe 2 times per week when they are new and 1 time per week after they have gotten started. Otherwise let them contact you. Contacting too often might offend or annoy .

Setting boundaries we all want our downline to succeed. We offer incentives but we don't want our downline to rely solely on us to build their business or rank. Definitely reward those who are working.

Forgetting to Recognize our wnlines efforts and accomplishments. Only communicating with our downlines as long as they are EA this month or working toward EA this month but not when they stop working the next month, week, month or year. We never know, so not communicating with all the downline may impact our relationship w/ our downline and business. If you arenot sure if you made a mistake ask your Sponsor, Upline, A2A friends and definitely the SFI Forum. Here's to mistakes so that we all keep on reading and learning so the next person doesn't have to make the same mistake.

Hope this helps.
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Hi Vladimir,
There are mistakes that you will make are they common or not so common. The important thing is to recognize a mistake by it's impact on your downline. did a post that was written to your downline make movers stop moving because it was condescending or demanding. Did a Team Leader not write to their affiliates PSA and CSA within those crucial 24 hours.

They are the back bone of our business and future leaders in our downlines. But remember everyone enters equally but
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Affiliate since: 10/01/2013, Power Rank: 75 | Read Aina's 157 other Ask SC answers

My personal opinion on mistakes you should avoid;

1) Not treating your business like a business
Signing up into an opportunity and just 'hoping' for things to happen, without
working very hard and completing tasks everyday to build your business, you will
fail.
If you are not committed to building your business, you will not last longer than a
month, end up quitting and become yet another statistics of failure.

2) Lack of Focus
The biggest mistake anyone can make in starting an online business is, not being
able to focus on their business.
Distractions online such as social media, videos and all the hypes that got your
attention, will take away your focus, and you will fail.

3) Giving your best energy to the wrong people
Check out genealogy and pick the most active and and render your assistance. Help
them get started right. Duplication.

4) Do not promise the World
Everyone must take their first step and first dollar. To get this, learning,
studying and applying/actions required.

5) Not teaching your downlines the concept of duplication/leveraging
You can't grow your business on your own. You need a team, a period. A team that
you need to lead, train and motivate. You need to shape your team into becoming
leaders like you. You need to teach them on how to prospect, recruit, sell and lead
their own team.

All the best to you.



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My personal opinion on mistakes you should avoid;

1) Not treating your business like a business
Signing up into an opportunity and just 'hoping' for things to happen, without
working very hard and completing tasks everyday to build your business, you will
fail.
If you are not committed to building your business, you will not last longer than a
month, end up quitting and become yet another statistics of failure.

2) Lack of Focus

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Affiliate since: 07/26/2007, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Williams's 638 other Ask SC answers

Here are my top common mistakes that all affiliates need to avoid.

1. Joining another business opportunity. You are not going to see significant gains in SFI until you FOCUS. People think that I am going to have multiple streams of income by joining more than one program. Let me tell from experience, until you have ONE stream of income online forget about creating another! Do what ever you need to do to grow your SFI business. Do it everyday. Track your efforts and you will succeed.

2. Failure to track your advertising efforts. Many affiliates make this common mistake. They think you can just post ads everywhere for free. Think about. If everyone is using free advertising what is the real value of that advertising? Is it creating signups? Sales? Free advertising does work but your will need to know which sources work best for you.

3. Don't fall for the misconception that you can build your business with no money out of your pocket. While it is probable, it is highly unlikely that you will gain the type of momentum you need to create a lasting business on thin air! Yes, you can recruit using free methods but it is not totally free. There are opportunity costs which are just as important if not more important than monetary cost. If you don't leverage your time when you don't have money then you are back to square zero!

4. Don't create 'dependents'. It's good to reward workers. Enough said.

5. Never transfer the responsibility of your success to your sponsor or your down line. You are responsible for your own success. If your network is to grow - you are responsible for growing it. Get support from your sponsor, upline, A2A, or wherever you can but don't depend on them! Read, study, learn, grow, and do for yourself.

6. Don't expect to get results without work. It will take everything you can muster and then some to grow a lasting business. Results will not be instantaneous in most cases so be prepared to work consistently. Quality over quantity always. So if you only have 2 hours to work your business, spend it wisely and productively, as often as you can.

7. Avoid the hype in your advertising. Don't overuse the term free. If you do people will expect it to be totally free! Rather set the expectation in your advertising and you will get better quality affiliates. For example, in a classified ad don't say 100% Free Business Opportunity. Sign Up Now. Make Money With Us! Instead say: Hot Business Opportunity. Free Registration. Make Money Following Our Proven System. See the difference?

8. A failure to plan is definitely the most sure way to fail. Set aside time to work on your business. Rid yourself of distractions. Set aside an advertising budget. Plan your activities each day and check them off as they are completed. Procrastination does not lead to success. People who take the right course of action
will produce results.

9. Don't invest more into your advertising than what you are getting out of them. Be aware of how much you spend and how much you make. While it will take some time to break even, set a threshold on spending. Know when you have to fold and back out. Don't just pour money into useless paid ads thinking you are going to see results on the back end.

10. Never quit. Too many affiliates give up before they see any results. After years of being in SFI I can tell you honestly that it took me 3 years to start seeing some progress. Now this was my fault but even with all of the effort I've put in over the several years since I'm still reaching for platinum. Not just platinum status - but platinum PAYCHECKS!
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Here are my top common mistakes that all affiliates need to avoid.

1. Joining another business opportunity. You are not going to see significant gains in SFI until you FOCUS. People think that I am going to have multiple streams of income by joining more than one program. Let me tell from experience, until you have ONE stream of income online forget about creating another! Do what ever you need to do to grow your SFI business. Do it everyday. Track your efforts and you will succeed.

2.
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Affiliate since: 04/15/2014, Power Rank: 99999999 | Read Marius's 11 other Ask SC answers

1. Assuming that your PSAs and CSAs share the same amount of enthusiasm as you do. Many people are skeptical about making money online, being overwhelmed by the amount of ads, banners, pop-ups and sites that claim to have THE RECIPE for getting one loads of money in no time. Unless they're signed up by a good friend who's proven to him/her his/her success here, the'll have all the reasons to be circumspect and keep the engagement impulse at low levels. This can be overcome by building trust and guiding him/her through.

2. Thinking that buying/auction winning your PSAs/CSAs is the key for fast building a strong, active and healthy network in your downline. The best affiliates you may get to join your network are the ones that know you personally or through your online presence and have the faith that you are a reliable person,as well as your suggestions and proposals. Building and maintaining a constant and high quality presence online (through a blog, specialized magazine, social channel/platform) is the best way to get you good, believing and active affiliates, willing to build their own network (which is, eventually, the key in this business), as long as you propose this business opportunity in the right context, triggering their interest and motivation.

3. Thinking that once you got the minimum five active PSAs (in order to grant you a solid, stable income) you should stop there and let the snowball roll. Keeping on adding PSAs in your downline can bring you closer to the exploding phase of your business you strive for and will keep you active and motivated. There is no real, good business that runs by itself.

4. Assuming that you owe something to the people in your downline or that they owe you something. Everybody here is in the business for him/her alone and for his/her success only. Of course, the synergy of the system, the way it was planned and engineered, is what makes things rolling and help everybody involved get a profit. Other than that, anybody is free to make decisions, take actions as it best suits their interests. If things work, they do so because they reach a phase where mutual trust and understanding are achieved.

5. Stopping before getting started. No need to expand on this one, I suppose.

Best of luck in your SFI endeavors!
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1. Assuming that your PSAs and CSAs share the same amount of enthusiasm as you do. Many people are skeptical about making money online, being overwhelmed by the amount of ads, banners, pop-ups and sites that claim to have THE RECIPE for getting one loads of money in no time. Unless they're signed up by a good friend who's proven to him/her his/her success here, the'll have all the reasons to be circumspect and keep the engagement impulse at low levels. This can be overcome by building trust and guiding
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Affiliate since: 09/06/2011, Power Rank: 10 | Read BABU's 113 other Ask SC answers

Our Downline members in SFI are like our backbones and without their activeness and success, no Leader can achieve greater goals in the system.

Normally, every now and then, we all make mistakes while leading our team members and building the downline so systematically. The common mistakes are.

1) Lack of proper communication and difficulties in understanding their own languages.
2) Inability to provide study materials and the lack of knowledge to explain the ways to grow in the system.
3) Inability to motivate and encourage the new members with a competitive Support Letter.
4) The lack of willingness to help the team members when they are in dire straits or when they need timely help.
5) Lack of constant interaction with team members through other various modes like, social networking sites regularly.
6) Inability to help them to set up business in SFI mainly through ECAs and its formalities.
7) Unable to reward them suitably on their achievements.

As far as I am concerned those are the common mistakes we make normally when we groom our downline to become successful and we can avoid such simple but grave mistakes through a proper and systematic planning and also with some efforts. Earlier, I used to make such mistakes but time and experience made me more matured and conscious to move ahead confidently and successfully. After all, no Leader can sustain for long without a strong, active and successful downline.

Do remember, a little more persistence, a little more effort, and what seemed hopeless failure may turn to glorious success. Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment, full effort is full victory.

Wish you a great and successful career with SFI.

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Our Downline members in SFI are like our backbones and without their activeness and success, no Leader can achieve greater goals in the system.

Normally, every now and then, we all make mistakes while leading our team members and building the downline so systematically. The common mistakes are.

1) Lack of proper communication and difficulties in understanding their own languages.
2) Inability to provide study materials and the lack of knowledge to explain the ways to
...more