Walking through the local mall the other day I ran into the Mad Butcher, Peter Leitch, owner of the Mad Butcher chain and rabid rugby league supporter. He asked how my day business was going. "Well it has been a little slower this year." "You know where the problem is?" he said "Look in the mirror!"

He does not believe in pulling any punches.

Now I have heard that from him before at another time our business was a bit quiet. Interestingly that conversation took place in a mall as well.

Peter is a well known personality in New Zealand and Australia, highly opinionated and entertaining. He supports the local rugby league side, the Warriors. He is involved in a number of community charities. And he had grown his chain from a single butcher's shop to a large number of outlets around the country at a time when supermarkets were competing strongly for the retail meat market.

At the initial talk he had told me that in his opinion you could grow a business in any time, in financial crises, recessions and all. To his mind you just applied yourself and it worked.

He had had his share of tight times in the past.

And recently, after a heart scare, he had sold his chain and become the figurehead. He was at the mall to check the local bookshop's display of his recently released autobiography.

This time he mentioned how most of his franchise chain of stores did great business with the odd one not doing so well. He related about a recent one where he had told the owner to get his head out of his ass and see what was going on. He still did not come right and was eventually replaced by another owner, with the same business model, who succeeded massively.

As he said, some owners tend to think they can have a business and be off having a good time thinking everything would tick over fine. And, as he mentioned, the staff are critical. He related it to bar staff and how some can be so unwelcoming and unhelpful, which, as he pointed out, in the current economic climate is not great for business.

In that brief chat he brought me back to focus on that gold nugget again. Any failure in my business, be it a traditional business or a home based business such as mlm was my responsibility.

Look in the mirror!

Rationalizing Why I Am Not Successful

It is so easy though to look and see reasons why a traditional business or multilevel marketing one might not be going so well.

I can look at the economic time (food and petrol price rises, property and finance market collapses, the hot weather in recent times) and rationalize as to why I was not seeing activity at the same level as the previous year.

But this is unhelpful. Those are factors I have no control over.

What Can I Do?

The one thing I can control is what I do.

What could I adjust that would make that difference?

Focus

At times it is about focus. What am I giving my attention to? Like the owners too busy out having a good time.

Action

At other times it is what I am actually doing.

As others have presented in the past, you want your customers to be raving fans. The strength of word of mouth advertising is huge.

Mindset

What my mindset is has a massive effect on business. If I have a wealthy, rich mindset, expecting massive results and income, looking for those opportunities, being always positive and grateful for what I have, that rubs off on customers and staff (or team members) which further affects production.

Taking Responsibility

In network marketing the person who has to assume responsibility for action in the team is me. If I am producing my team will follow. If I am not and just sitting around waiting for someone else to do it, so will everyone else and nothing will happen.

The answer is to do the work for the production myself, earn bonuses and residual income, and then others in the team will follow - usually not all but enough to cause a major change in overall production.

It is my business to take ownership of and create the wealth.

The Internet Recruiting Revolution

That is where the internet recruiting for network marketing comes into its own. Here I assume responsibility to create some momentum and exposure. I assume a position of leadership and look for how best to do the business. I see that the best multiple exposures are obtained through the internet and develop the process for the best way of doing it - always being aware of what has been done and what is already available out there.

By taking this on board and testing and tweaking it as I go, the business will grow.

If I wait for someone to do it for me or hand it to me, little or nothing will happen.

Also unless I take ownership of what I do and find what works for me as an individual, it will never be the best fit and the most powerful mechanism for exploding the business.