Two weeks ago my wife, who is a spreadsheet and numbers whiz sat me down, as only a wife can do, and showed me how “I left $48,255 dollars on the table” by not participating in a MLM program offered by one of my major direct mail marketing suppliers.

I have always had a somewhat vocal, negative attitude about MLM organizations. This was due to my distasteful past experiences with several high profile MLM companies during the late 1980s. A few who nearly hired me as a marketing consultant attempted to barter my services for their products. Trade-outs have never excited me. I cannot feed my family or keep the lights on by bartering my services. Besides, why should I when I have plenty of clients willing to pay me with good old American greenbacks!

After my wife’s lesson, I decided to reconsider MLM since leaving $48,255 dollars on the table disturbed me, to put it mildly.

While the MLM business model has been around for at least 70 years, there are a few new players in the MLM Industry who have very generously skewed their commissions and bonuses in favor of their sales organizations with astonishingly positive results.

One such company www.sendoutcards.com, (SOC) founded in 2004, in Salt Lake City in just 5 years achieved annual revenues of $140 million. This privately-held  company is entirely debt-free and continues to experience double digit growth despite this worsening Recession.

They offer unique, in-demand services in the formerly sleepy $7.5 billion Greeting Cards Industry. Unique because greeting card buyers can (from the convenience of the computers) select a card from an online inventory of over 15,000 postcards, two or three panel glossy stock greeting cards; enter the name and address of the recipient into a contact management system; compose a personalized message online, then transmit that captured information with a single Click on the SEND CARD screen button. It goes to the company’s Salt Lake City Mail Processing Center.

Each night, hundreds of thousands of personalized greeting cards are processed; inserted into envelopes with return and sender addressee direct imprinting on the envelope (no labels) plus a first class stamp is affixed and envelopes are sealed, trayed and delivered to the Salt Lake City Sectional Center for mailing for a mere cost to the sender of between $1.06 – $1.42 each.

While e-mail has negatively impacted US Postal Service profits and a 2 cent First-Class Postage Rate hike is in the works, to offset a $7 billion dollar deficit; the Send Out Cards business is expanding at an exponential growth rate.

I joined SOC in January 2006 and I was issued a 4 digit User ID number. Yesterday, a friend was issued a 6 digit User ID number which is proof of over 106,000 member enrollments in six years.

SOC has built a better MLM Model which has driven this new contender to the forefront of the formerly sleepy $7.5 billion Greeting Cards Industry dominated by Hallmark and American Greeting Cards. SOC, the new kid on the block, is gulping up market share because of their technological innovation and a refreshing simple but effective MLM business model.

In my next blog, I will elaborate on SOC’s success and why I have become a devoted disciple.

Dirty Harry Callahan got it right with this most famous movie one-liner. In the context it was spoken in The Enforcer it was never intended to improve anyone’s day.  Today, in this blog let’s consider a more positive, fresher version.

Sometimes an e-mail or phone call just won’t work to help a friend through their ‘bad day blues’. Especially, in today’s ruthless, roller-coaster economy where lots of people are suffering serious personal and financial challenges, with many ending in tragedy.

When tragedy hits close to home it’s a quick splash of cold water reality in the face. Last week, we heard about two in our church family. One lost his job and house to foreclosure. The other, unemployed for 8 months with lapsed health insurance, discovered his wife had an advanced-stage cancer.

I prefer to send 3 greeting cards over a 3 week period to let people know we really care and we’re here for them, for the long haul. Why 3? It sends a strong signal their friends are in their hearts and prayers and they are not weathering this crisis alone.

Like many, my busy schedule gets in the way of going to the store to pick out the right card to send. Unlike others, I’ve taught time management training so I feel double guilt when I don’t do what I instruct others to do. Shame on me!

Here’s my near-perfect solution for personal and business card-sending. You may recall, I train sales pros and small biz owners how to painlessly get new customers.

In 2006, I discovered a process for opening doors, minds and hearts. It is the single most effective component for ending cold-calling described by some as the scourge of the selling profession. Since then, I have created dozens of greeting card-based direct mailing campaigns that have achieved double-digit sales-buster results.

In 2007, I’m was almost embarrassed to sit opposite a CEO of a $130 million dollar software company to tell him I was replacing his expensive, slick direct mail marketing campaign, which he paid his former advertising agency, big bucks to create and print, with 3 off-the-shelf personalized greeting cards. 

Almost embarrassed, because I snail-mailed him these 3 off-the-shelf greeting cards with the right message. My reward was our first in-person sales appointment because I gave him a live demo. I proved it worked with my in-your-face Mr. CEO Demo!

 I demonstrated exactly what I had in mind for his sales team to use to get the focused attention of starch-collared chemical engineers who made the final decision to buy his expensive software solution or that of his competitors.

His former advertising agency rep thought it was funny until he was instructed not to come back which gave me a great deal of ‘make my day’ satisfaction!

The right greeting card with a matching right message snail-mailed to the right decision-maker at their business address is all it takes to set the stage for a timely phone follow up call. But ‘right’ is the key. Executed properly, this process completely disarms the coldness associated with communicating effectively with a stranger.  

Here’s why. We are people 24/7 underneath our decision-maker, doctor, lawyer, nurse, starch-collared chemical engineer’s skin. Even on the job, when we become our alter work egos, we still laugh, tear and act human when triggered to do so.

In our cut-throat economy with paper-thin margins, tight budgets and longer work days people crave a quickie break from their daily grind. Relieve this tension, for a few seconds, and they will remember and appreciate your tasteful, funny gesture.

You can do it for less than the cost of a cup of 7/11 coffee and in nearly the same time it takes to pour, mix and cap that cup of hot java. I’m still astonished at how few marketing professionals apply this psychology to their positioning advantage. Their oversight has become my competitive advantage.

Personalized, funny, colorful graphic images on off-the-shelf greeting cards can be used very effectively to trigger these human nature tendencies we all share.

I use Sendoutcards.com, an online greeting card processor, headquartered in Salt Lake City, UT to automate this need. What www.sendoutcards.com has so brilliantly done is made the process of sending personalized greeting cards a time-saving, no-brainer anyone can execute from the convenience of their favorite chair and computer.

In minutes, you can select a card from several categories of a constantly refreshed 7,000 card online inventory. Appropriate-to-the occasion glossy, coated cards with eye-popping colors and/or pictures with serious or humorous wording are available.

A very user-friendly online navigational system prompts you to open the electronic image of the card on your computer screen; type a personalized message; add a first name or title (Mr., Ms, Mrs.) last name; colorize the type font and even add your picture and your facsimile signature. Other options include adding denominational gift cards from The Home Depot, Chili’s, Barnes & Noble and other nationwide retailers.

Names and contact info, including a company name are captured in a database which can be imported from an Excel or other common CSV database files, or manually entered.

Merging the selected card(s) with the database addressees takes minutes and your personalized greeting card mailings are ready to go! The entire process of sending a snail-mailed, personalized greeting card (or as many as you choose) takes minutes, online, instead of the hassle of shopping for a card and manually processing it, the old-fashioned way.

Once you proof your message, you CLICK on Send Card and the named addressee, your return address, the selected card with your message are electronically transmitted to SendOutCards’ computer servers in Salt Lake City, for processing within 24 hours.

Best of all, there are no label-addressed envelopes. It’s a direct-imprint on the outside envelope and it even includes an affixed first class stamp for first-class personalization.

FACT: Whether you choose to imitate my success or not, Americans love to receive greeting cards at work or at home. Putting Human Nature to work in the marketplace can be a very rewarding experience for those who demonstrate tasteful creativity to achieve their corporate marketing goals with this innovative and inexpensive process.

I encourage you to investigate www.sendoutcards.com. Should you wish to wander around their website, enter ID # 8265, to gain online access.

My Power Prospecting® ebook for sale for $40 includes my 4 card campaign with the copy if you wish to duplicate my 83% success response while minimizing your risk. Just CLICK on the Power Prospecting ebook button in the right margin. You can download my FREE minibook before you buy at my www.powerprospectingebook.com website.

So, go ahead and make someone’s day and discover what I learned (and, maybe, profit too) about why Americans love to be carded.