Marshall and Christine Hughey are a Power Couple here in Las Vegas. As a team, they are awesome teachers and mentors. Along with much successful business experience building other business owner’s businesses and their own businesses, the Hughey’s are following a Multi-Level Marketing Business platform.

Q: Tell us a little bit about what types of businesses you’ve owned or operated to give us some perspective on your perspective.

A: We have been in financial services for over 20 years. Part of the time we were employed with different firms. We have started a couple of business over the years from scratch. We have also been involved in several MLMs, but we describe it more accurately as “referral compensation” business .

Q: What about owning an MLM business appeals to you? What’s your favorite thing about owning an MLM business?

A: Several things appeal to us about MLM businesses:

• The referral compensation: Everybody’s told someone they should see a movie or eat at a particular restaurant. Then those you’ve told could tell others, and before you know it, 50-60 people are watching a movie or eating at the restaurant because of your one referral.
• Time leverage: If you are a busy person and you feel like you don’t have the time for this sort of thing, then it is perfect for you. Your 3 hours a week and asking 3 other busy people with only 3 hours a week means you have 12 hours working now towards your business each week.
• Technology leverage: The internet with online store fronts and the parent company takes care of everything for you.

Our favorite thing about an MLM business is being a real service to others and truly helping them; we believe this is a life changing opportunity.

Q: What’s the biggest challenge of owning an MLM business?

A: We don’t look at things now as challenges but only as progression.

Q: How did you choose your specific MLM business?

A: We prayed and changed our life plan from the path we were on to the one God directed us to. And we were directed to FreeLife International as the company we should refer people to.

Q: Can you really make any money owning an MLM business, and does the money come as easily as many MLM’s say in their marketing?

A: Yes, you can make money! The company that we were directed to has an income statistic chart they put out each year. Some of the top earners earn over 2 million dollars a year. This kind of money comes with the amount of effort you want to put in to your business. It is a direct reflection on how many people you help.

Q: Tell me a bit about what makes a good training program in an MLM business?

A: We first start with our core principle of being a service to others and allowing people to be who they are and not requiring them to become someone different to be successful.

Q: How are you using online network marketing to expand your business?

A: We use online marketing mostly now for our training purpose, with audio and written messages for anyone to be inspired to continue with working their business.

The company also uses online ordering and store fronts that keep you well informed about all the products and meeting, etc.

Q: How do you approach goal-setting?

A: Our goal setting is a little different – 2 parts:

1. The people that choose to join with us, their goals become our goals. We make their goals our priority.
2. We teach that you should not set your goal so high that you become discouraged. We want people to set reasonable achievable goals each day. Little strokes fell great oaks – better to have little consistent activity then big inconsistent activity.

Q: Do you think systems are important in business? If so, what’s so important about systems?

A: The system is important because it is a way to help people set goals. The system that we have uses core principles of being open to new information and passing it on.

Q: Your main MLM business is Jule of the Orient. Why did you choose this business?

A: Jule of the Orient is a product of FreeLife, the company we chose because, quite literally, we were directed by God to join.

Q: Are you following a system created by Jule of the Orient, or have you combined it with your own successful system? What part of your system is your creation?

A: What came first was Plexus Gathering System. It was given to us as an answer to prayer. We refer to ourselves as co-founders of the Plexus Gathering System. Then what came after was the direction to join FreeLife which has the same principle of service to others.

Q: What personal attributes lead to success for a MLM business owner?

A: Just be who you are – nothing different than you were created by God to be.

Q: What is the Plexus Gathering System all about?

A: Plexus Gathering System is a way to transform what you want into what you have. It is transmutation from the unseen to our physical reality. In its broadest definition it is alchemy.

And our Bonus Question: Mac or PC?

A: PC but with resentment!

You can contact Marshall and Christine Hughey by email, and you can find them on Facebook, as well.

I ask myself, “Do I follow my own business advice?”  Within my own businesses, do I do the very things that I suggest other people do in theirs?

It’s really a great feeling to know that yes, I do follow my own advice.  When faced with a choice within my own businesses, I actually think about how I would advise one of my clients when faced with the same decision.  And then I follow that advice.

I meet a lot of business owners, and one of the things that always impresses me is a business owner who has made a business out of following his own advice.

Larry Brauner

A great example of someone who follows his own business advice is my friend and associate, Larry Brauner.

Larry’s business is helping other businesses navigate the intricacies of the web and online marketing.  He knows the ins-and-outs of how to market yourself and your business utilizing tools readily available to you on the Internet, such as blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites.

I like that Larry has used these resources effectively to market himself and his business.  He doesn’t just tell you how to do it, he does these things for his own business, and finds that they work!  He has had measurable success, i.e., traffic and subscription to his blogs, fans and followers on social websites, articles picked up and discussed on the web, and clients who hire him based on what he can do in all these arenas.

Larry practices what he preaches.

Do you follow the advice you give to your clients?

Many people call me with questions regarding LLC vs. S-Corporation. While researching on the internet is helpful, sifting through all of the information out there can be a bit daunting.

The hardest part is figuring out how the two types of entities compare and then deciding what that means to your particular business. The following chart lines up the comparative differences between an S-Corporation and an LLC:

	S-Corporation	LLC (Limited Liability Company)
Formation requirements	Must file with state, state-specific filing fee required.	Must file with state, state-specific filing fee required.
Administrative Requirements	Election of board of directors/officers, annual meetings, and state-specific annual report filing requirements.	Relatively few requirements. State specific annual reporting requirements.
Management	Shareholders elect directors who manage business activities.	Members can set up structure as they choose.
Term	Perpetual: Can exist past death or withdrawal of shareholders.	Perpetual, unless state requires fixed amount of time.
Eligibility of Owners	Up to 99 shareholders; each must be an individual and must be a US Citizen.	No restrictions on eligible owners.
Special Allocations	Special allocations aren’t allowed. Income, gain, and loss all pass through to the shareholders based on stock ownership.	Special allocations are allowed if the allocations have substantial economic impact.
Personal Liability	Shareholders not typically held liable.	Members not typically held liable.
Taxation	No tax at the entity level. Income passed through to shareholders.	No tax at the entity level. Income passed through to the members.
Double Taxation	No	No
Self-employment Tax	Salary subject to self-employment tax. Shareholder distributions not subject to self-employment tax.	Salary subject to self-employment tax.
Tax Form	1120S; shareholders get K-1 for personal tax returns.	1 member: sole proprietor IRS form 1040 Schedule C; Partnership: IRS form 1065; members get a K-1 for personal tax returns.
Pass Through Taxes	Yes	Yes
Capital Raising	Shares of stock are sold to raise capital.	May sell interests, but subject to operating agreement.

Choosing the right entity for your business can be a bit scary. Remember that your individual goals will determine which entity is best for your business, and not everyone will make the same determination. That’s okay.

If you would like an individual consultation to help you figure it out, call me to schedule a free consultation, and I’ll help you figure it out.

I recently ordered some shoes for my four kids online from Zappos, the shoe store.

If you wear many hats in your business like I do, you might find yourself short on time when it comes to things like shoe shopping.

You might be a bit nervous about ordering shoes online without being able to try them on, make sure they fit, make sure they’re comfortable, and so forth. I really was.

What I found when I visited the Zappos website surprised me. It’s an incredible company with some really creative ideas and solutions.

Zappos must have realized that ordering shoes without trying them on first can pose some challenges to shoe shoppers. So to compete with retail locations, Zappos has made the shopping experience easy and even pleasant.

My Zappos Experience

My parents bought a set of super cute pink, white, and black Heely’s for one of my daughters and had them shipped to us. The shoes arrived for her birthday and were a bit too small.

I called up the Zappos toll-free number, and the lady that I talked with was extremely friendly. She sounded like she was having a great day at a great job.

She emailed me a return shipping label while we were on the phone together. Then she told me that she would upgrade me to a VIP customer (understand here, that I myself had never ordered from Zappos at that point — mom had done the ordering). She sent the correct size of shoes overnight to me so that my young and disappointed daughter would have them right away.

And she did that before I even sent back the shoes that were the wrong size!

All I had to do on my end was put the shoes back in the box that they came in, print out the shipping label from my email, and drop the whole thing off at the UPS store. Zappos even paid for the return shipping!

The Heely’s arrived the next day, my girl was thrilled, and I decided to buy some shoes myself for the kids.

The Power of Being a Zappos VIP Customer

When I went online to order, I still had my VIP status. That means that when I purchase anything, it’s shipped to me overnight. Free of charge. Anything that I have to return is shipped back on the Zappos nickel, and whatever exchange I need is also shipped to me overnight free of charge.

Zappos solves a problem with the free overnight shipping policy. Retail shoppers are often have an “instant gratification” mentality, meaning that shoppers want to buy something and take it home right now. Shopping online usually means that a shopper has to wait for the order. But the Zappos overnight shipping gets the product to the shopper as fast as possible.

Choosing Shoes

I picked out the shoes for the kids using the awesome selector tools on the Zappos site. You can input choices like color, size, style, heel height, etc.

They’ve really simplified the process of looking through pages and pages of so many types of shoes. I always like tools to save my time and my eyesight!

The shoes were shipped out overnight as promised, and the kids were thrilled. The only setback was that I ordered the wrong size for my littlest one.

Another Call to Zappos

I called the toll-free number for the company, and as I listened to the computerized menu choices to get to the right department for my needs, I heard the last choice, number 5. You push number 5 to hear the joke of the day! I did actually choose 5 on the first go-round, and indeed it was the joke of the day! (I did call back the next day to see whether or not they had a new joke of the day, and they did).

While chatting with the very nice and very enthusiastic customer loyalty gal, she emailed me the return shipping label and info for the pair of shoes in the wrong size. She had the correct-sized pair sent to me overnight once again, and she suggested that I wait for that pair to get to me so that I could use the box to return the wrong pair (the box the original order came in was a big box with several pairs of shoes).

I am Now a Loyal Zappos Customer

I am now a firm believer in Zappos. They have a great selection with competitive prices, an easy-to-use website, and a really great customer loyalty team (that’s their title for that department).

What’s the Real Point?

Here’s the real point of this little story: Zappos has adopted an original business approach, finding ways to create excitement and loyalty from their customers, even though they are in a market traditionally cornered by brick and mortar retail locations.

They didn’t focus on all of the reasons that an online shoe store won’t succeed; instead they have found creative solutions for those things that looked like limitations and turned them into ways to win the customer’s loyalty.

Take a Look at Zappos Core Values:

As we grow as a company, it has become more and more important to explicitly define the Zappos core values from which we develop our culture, our brand, and our business strategies. These are the ten core values that we live by:

1. Deliver WOW Through Service
2. Embrace and Drive Change
3. Create Fun and A Little Weirdness
4. Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open-Minded
5. Pursue Growth and Learning
6. Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication
7. Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit
8. Do More With Less
9. Be Passionate and Determined
10. Be Humble

How’s that for a set of company core values?

BusinessDictionary.com defines a business system as:

Methodical procedure or process, used as a delivery mechanism for providing goods or services to customers in a well defined market.

What does the definition really mean?

Let’s look at each part:

• Methodical procedure or process – A step-by-step sequence of actions.  You have a defined set of steps you follow each time you do something for a customer.
• Used as a deliver mechanism for providing goods or services – Simply, the way you do something so that you get paid.
• To customers in a well defined market – You know to whom you are trying to sell your goods or services.

Many of us first think of starting a business as a solution to some situation in our lives.  Maybe we lost a job or got re-located, or maybe we started a family and would like more time with our kids.  It could be that we just don’t like our boss anymore.  And some of us saw that we could fill a need for customers and take control of our own fortunes by not working for someone else’s business anymore.

There are as many reasons for starting businesses and many businesses types. However, there are few business systems.  I have seen and experienced lots of businesses, which lack a system, including some of my own.

How often have you heard something like, “Mr. Smith is the business; without him, the business would cease to exist”?

And how often have you thought or heard someone else saying, “I just can’t trust anyone else to get it all done the right way”?

If you went into business making some product or offering some service that you just happen to love or know lots about, you might not have thought at the beginning (or even now) that you also need to have a business system.

Plan for Success, Not Failure

The idea is to plan for success.  Too often, we worry about failure and what will happen if it doesn’t all work out.  The real problems begin when we have terrific success but we wear all of the hats in our business and can’t keep up with the demand for our product or service.

So, instead of worrying about failure, start planning for success.  It’s time to get the business out of your head and into a concrete system.

The Internet and the use of computers and other technology have brought unlimited resources for building some kind of system.  You don’t have to jump into anything too huge, but you do have to jump in.

Think about such things as:

• Do I have a concrete formula for pricing?
• Can someone else pick up where I’ve left off if suddenly I can’t work?
• Am I able to show someone else what I do in a way that they can understand?
• Is it possible to organize client information so that it is not just “floating around” in my head?
• Are my sources, such as vendors, organized with contact information, pricing, and the other necessary details so that someone else could see how to order what my business needs?
• Can I take some time off from my business and still keep the money coming in?  Or does the business stop and stagnate and possibly lose momentum if I don’t show up to work today?

Think as an Entrepreneur Thinks

Have you considered that it might be possible to set up your business in such a way that you can show other people how to run it, and then you can spend your time doing all of those things you thought you’d be able to do once you stopped working for someone else?

Have you considered that you can train someone else, if you have a solid system for fulfilling the demands of the business, and then spend your time building another business?

It is possible to think like an entrepreneur rather than someone who just created their own J.O.B.  It just takes a little planning.