I remember twelve years ago when I made my first real attempt to start building a network marketing business. At the time, I had been working in the corporate world for a little over a year and was in the process of trying to start my own company.

I had become a student of personal development, so when I met a 27 year old millionaire who had already achieved the success I desired, I knew that the smart thing to do was to model his actions and hopefully get the same results. Well, while this is generally very good advice, there are a few other things in the equation that need to be considered.

When a friend of mine told me about this young superstar entrepreneur who had become a millionaire in sixteen months by building a successful network marketing business, I knew I had just found the road map to success that I had been looking for. It turned out that this young guy had made all of his money in a previous company and was now involved with a new start-up company that offered us the chance to be among the first to get in at the “ground floor”.

Not knowing what I should be looking for in a company, or what questions I should have been asking, I opted to follow this young “successful leader”. After all, he was already a millionaire, driving a Ferrari and Mercedes at the age of 27, and seemed to be an expert at what he was doing.

The day I decided to join this company, I was the epitome of what a lot of industry veterans refer to as “ignorance on fire”. I don’t remember the exact number for sure, but I believe that on the day that I faxed in my paperwork to join my new company, I also had 17 other applications of people I had already sponsored into the business.

From everything I knew about leveraging the efforts of other people with network marketing, I was sure that I was poised for massive success. I rented rooms to hold our meetings at our local community center, printed invitations, cold called network marketers from other companies, held lunch meetings, made countless three-way calls and invited anyone who would listen to our conference calls.

Everything seemed to be going great for the first month. Then one day, shortly after getting started, I got the news that this new “ground floor opportunity” had already been run into the ground. This company was already out of business in less than one year of doing business. I was upset to say the least.

When I look back on this series of events, I now know that I learned quite a bit from that experience, and I wouldn’t change the way things happened because of that. However, there is no need for you to have to go through a similar experience, so I want to share with you some of the things I learned and what I wish someone like me could have told me back then:

1. Even more important than how great a product seems to be, is the quality of the management team of the company you are considering joining. A strong and experienced management team is absolutely crucial to the success of a company. The quality of your company’s product is important, but the quality of the management team is crucial. A company can have the greatest product around, but if the management team is clueless, then they won’t be around long.

2. Once you are comfortable with the management team that is in place with the company you are considering, one of the most important decisions you will make is the team within the company that you decide to join. You want to be able to find a team that fits your personality and style and will offer the type of training and mentorship that will allow you to constantly improve your level of skill and personal growth.

3. Make sure you know exactly “Why” you want to succeed in a home business. If you have a strong enough “Why” coupled with the system your team uses to build the business, you can achieve massive success. Your “Why” is what will drive you to keep working hard on your goals when things aren’t going just the way you expected.

4. Don’t worry about jumping into a hot new business just because you can get in on the “ground floor”. The sad fact is that most new companies don’t succeed, which is why you need to spend time making sure you are comfortable with the competence level of the management team. If a company is truly offering a great opportunity today, then it will likely still be a great opportunity six months or a year down the road.

5. Have fun building your business, or in whatever you decide to do with your life. Life is brief and it is not a trial run…everyday is the real deal, so make the most of it. Before I got to the point in my life where I knew I was doing exactly what I wanted to be doing, I used to struggle with some of things I would read and listen to about achieving success. One of these ideas that challenged me was the following question: “If you were given a check for a million dollars tomorrow, would you change what you are currently doing with your life?” If the answer to this question is yes, then you are in serious jeopardy of wasting the precious time that you have been given in your life.

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Rich Hazlett personally mentors his team and teaches them how to market their business without chasing leads or bothering uninterested family and friends.

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