Most people think finding the newest "top Home Based Business" is the answer to success. When in truth, no matter which Home Based Business opportunity you find, most often it has one major obstacle to overcome - finding people interested in the product or opportunity.

If you have joined an opportunity in the past or even recently - I'm sure the first thing you ultimately discovered after familiarizing yourself about your new product, company, compensation plan, and marketing strategy was that you need a way to find people to buy your product or join your organization. The first step for most is to go out and buy fresh and or real time leads and spend a fortune in the process. And if you originally thought that the cost to join the program was steep, now you're spending even more on leads without seeing great results.

This, I believe, is putting the cart before the horse. You need to learn how to effectively find people to buy your product or join your opportunity before you even choose what product/opportunity you want to pitch. What you need more than the "perfect product" is a lead generation system to generate leads online.

It is not uncommon to join a company, get your product, business cards, website, and a few brochures only to quickly realize what you need is a plan to market yourself. It seems that your up-line and company are doing everything to help train you to start marketing the opportunity. All along telling you to hang on and NOT TO GIVE UP. This seems backwards to me. What you really need is an effective lead generation strategy, tools and possibly even a lead generation program. Why not first learn if you are willing or capable of marketing an opportunity? Wouldn't it be a good idea to know this before spending the hefty "sign-up costs" and getting yourself committed to a monthly "auto-ship" only to have unsold product collecting in your garage?

Upon researching the industry, you will find people promoting the myth that if you don't have their "secret" you are doomed to join the 97% of people that fail in home-based businesses. With that said, the person peddling the "secret" may or may not have the "secret" that works for you?

What if you started learning what you need to do to be successful, first? You might even find out during the process what you are good at and what you're not. Trust me, on the bottom is where most people end up after joining their new "top home-based business" and for some, even after joining their 10th. Ouch!

It's not surprising that most companies will "focus" on the product or compensation plan as the key to your success. And why not since the company and your upline only make money when you buy product. Then starts the training that you're expected to replicate which consist mainly of promoting how the product is the answer! But what if you changed YOUR focus? Maybe you don't need some super-duper product, or debt free company to "make it." Maybe what you need first is to learn how to sell and market YOU.

Yes, YOU! You start each day searching for the perfect opportunity when here it's been waking up with you every morning. Any successful Home-Based Business owner knows they have to do a good job of marketing himself or herself. You may notice some people will have short-term success or a great month focusing on marketing the product or the opportunity - but the ones that make it for the long haul are marketing themselves.

So, what if you started by marketing yourself instead of ending there? Crazy idea, I know - but what if? You might be thinking to yourself right now, "Well if it's true it would be a lot easier." Certainly it would be much easier to do than figuring out how to sell and convince a bunch of people to join your MLM.

If you were to market yourself, instead of a product, what would that look like? We know that the only way to attract people is to have something they want. Well, we know that one can only succeed in a home-based business by being able to generate quality prospects while not going broke in the process. You can offer that vital information to people. Offer your prospects a way to generate leads online without going bankrupt. When you learn and possess the most effective lead generation tools and understand and know how to teach effective lead generation strategy, you have something to offer. Not only will it secure your position as a leader in your company, but will give you an avenue to produce affiliate income to survive the building process while you learn.

It is a completely different way of thinking, so best start by learning how to market YOU.