Sometimes babies are the best examples of what not to do in your network marketing business. Here’s what I learned from mine.My youngest son is very wise for being almost 2.

Take today for example. I put him in his socks and shoes, because sometimes he likes to run around before he gets dressed. And well, I don’t want him to hurt his feet, so on with the socks and shoes.

But then, about 20 minutes later, I need to put his pants on him - sweat pants.

For those of you that wouldn’t deign to put on sweats, let me break it down for you:

It is almost impossible to put sweats on after you’ve put your shoes on. It’s a real struggle, a pain, and you’d save a lot more time if you’d just put your sweats on BEFORE your shoes.

I’m sure you can see where this leads with my marketing lesson o’ the week.

Many times, we have an end result in mind (being fully dressed), but we take a short cut that gives us an immediate result (get your shoes on so you can be mobile). Eventually, though, that “short cut” ends up costing us time, energy, or money (or all of the above) that could have been used more effectively had we just stuck to our original plan.

Are you getting sidetracked? Are you looking at ideas that sound great in the short term - and may even produce immediate results - but in the long term are killing your productivity, effectiveness or long-term relationships?

As a Network Marketing professional, it’s important to do the things you must in order to move your business forward, but it’s very easy to get caught up in “creative” ideas that simply slow you down.

Don’t reinvent the wheel. If you have a program that’s working, stick to it. Look at tweaking it for improvements over time.

Above all, keep the END result in mind to avoid being distracted by what seems like a great idea in the moment.

Have a game plan, a target and a means of making it happen. Then STICK to it. If you’re absolutely convinced that you need to make changes, consider those changes in light of the overall goal and end result you have in mind.

Like putting your shoes on first, those short term strategies may work for now, but ultimately, you may have to undo everything you’ve done, take off your shoes, and put your sweats on first.

My kid gets it. Why don’t we sometimes?

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After nearly 10 years in Direct Sales, Lisa Young stopped listening to her up-line and started seeking professional sales and marketing wisdom from the far corners of big business. Today Lisa offers ready-to-use insights, tips and inspiration to others in the Home Party Plan community looking to run their business like a business and achieve success. Lisa’s free monthly newsletter “PartyOn!” features articles from a business perspective designed to help MLM reps reach their booking, sales and recruiting goals. You can sign up for the newsletter at http://www.HomePartySolution.com