Author • Investor • Entrepreneur • Network Marketing Evangelist

Writing down my experiences about USANA’s 19^th annual International Convention has been a much larger task than I had anticipated. I had hoped to write about each day the morning after, but here it is three evenings after the last day and I am just now finishing up. For those of you interested in reading the entire series in chronological order, I invite you to start with Part 1 here.

Lots of people started the day with a 5K run/walk to benefit the Children’s Hunger Fund. Although I donate to CHF, I have yet to participate in their 5K. Burnout always seems to set in after three very full days, and I relish the luxury of sleeping in on Saturday morning. The four Training Stages didn’t start until 10 a.m. Here are the ones I attended:

• Utilizing Social Media – Soomin Kim (Ruby Director, 1 step above Gold) and Christa Maclellan (Gold Director) – Soomin talked about Facebook, and Christa about Twitter. Facebook currently has 650 million active users. If it were a country, it would be the third largest in the world. Brand yourself and your lifestyle through social media. Do you want to be different from most? Be positive! Soomin listed some great Facebook do’s and don’ts for promoting your business without being offensive. With Twitter, the first step Christa advised us to do was to upload a photo of our face for our avatar. Otherwise you look anonymous. The next step is to design (or have designed) a custom background. With tweets, content is king. Talk about what has your attention, not what you’re doing. Promote other people. Be interesting and interested. When promoting your business, make it useful. Balance business with personal. When you’re balanced, you can promote more effectively.
• The Benefits of Income Maximizer – Brian Bohlke (Ruby Director) – Income Maximizer is USANA’s Web-based back office to help you manage and build your business more effectively. It includes Web hosting but is so much more, and it costs only $19.95 per four-week cycle. Why everyone doesn’t already have this, I can’t imagine. I enjoy attending sessions on Income Maximizer to learn more tips and techniques for using the tool more effectively. This presentation did not disappoint. One of Brian’s first questions to the audience was, “Who here, by a show of hands, loves to see an Advanced Options button?” Mine was one of the few hands that rose. Through his presentation, however, he convinced many more people to embrace Advanced Features wherever they can be found. Income Maximizer offers the following features:
  • E Cards – Think of this as email on steroids. With one click you can email your entire downline, all of your Preferred Customers, or any targeted subset thereof.
  • Web hosting – This one feature is worth $19.95 per month. It’s easy to customize your own USANA website. Mine can be found at carl.usana.com.
  • Health & Freedom Solution – One of the ways you can present the Health & Freedom Solution is on your website. A popup window appears in front of your USANA website (see an example here), and you can walk your prospects through the products, the business, or both, as you see fit.
  • Webmail – It’s important to brand USANA when you’re writing an email. Which is more professional: carl@usana.com or fuzzybunnyslippers72@hotmail.com? USANA Webmail can help you project a more professional image.
  • DLM (Downline Management) – We’ll hear about this in the next Training Stage I attended.
• Using DLM to Build a Stronger Business – Karen Shumka (Diamond Director, 3 steps above Gold) – Karen is passionate about leadership and growth. Think of DLM as your ATM. By keeping an eye on your downline volume, you can maximize your weekly earnings. According to George Odiorne, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” The Volume Report can help you decide where to place a new Associate or Preferred Customer, and which downline to focus on in any given week. Recognition will make you more money than anything else. Simply recognize the advancers in your organization. Bill Gates avers, “As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.” Thomas S. Monson said, “When performance is measured, performance improves. When performance is measured and reported back, the rate of improvement accelerates.” And one final quote by Chuck Coonradt: “In the absence of clearly defined goals, we are forced to concentrate on activity and ultimately become enslaved by it.”
• Media Center: How to Utilize It in Your Business – Brett & Melanie Ethridge (Ruby Directors) – The Media Center is an ever-growing library of USANA’s video snippets, which can be embedded in websites and blogs (I’ve been known to do this from time to time), emailed to prospects, and shared in social media. However, keep in mind that technology supports but does not replace relationship building.

The afternoon’s Closing Session was inspirational and uplifting as always. The highlights for me were the following:

• Christopher Gardner – author of The Pursuit of Happyness – As difficult as the past several years have been for me (and for many of us), I can only begin to imagine the horror of becoming homeless with a one-year-old in tow. Such was Chris Gardner’s story, which was made into a great motion picture starring Will Smith and his son Jaden Christopher Syre Smith. Chris offered many pearls of wisdom in his inspiring keynote speech. “I’m going to become world-class at something.” Find your “button.” The best father sometimes has to be a good mother.
• “Living the Dream” – song and dance number – This was hilarious, inspiring, and of the caliber of a Broadway musical. I hope USANA adds a video of it in the Media Center. I’ll be sure to post it right away. It had actors portraying some of USANA’s top income earners—actors for all but Michael Callejas and Aaron Dinh, who were actually quite talented dancers and singers (or at least lip-synchers).
• Michael Callejas and Aaron Dinh – Gen Y leaders in USANA, I didn’t write down their ranks – I heard Michael Callejas speak at last year’s Convention, and I though he was the best speaker there. I am always amazed by twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings that “get it.” One of Michael’s quotes: “Timing is more important than talent.”
• Matt Chionis – he and his parents are also USANA Associates whose rank I neglected to note – His most memorable word of advice to us: “Help someone else dream again.”
• Alexander Denk – stuntman, chef, and fitness expert, according to What’s Up, USANA? – “The Denkster” is another USANA Associate whose rank I neglected to record. We were treated to a video showing him in action. One quote that stuck with me: “If you help enough people with their problems, your problems disappear.” Now read that back with an Arnold Schwarzenegger accent and you can imagine how fellow Austrian Alexander Denk speaks.

Convention is over, and soon I shall be back home despite Hurricane Irene. But my life has been forever changed by USANA, and now it’s my turn to step up to the plate. It’s time that I helped others to dream once more. The two most common complaints I hear have to do with physical health or financial health. USANA is uniquely qualified to help with both at the same time. I am honored to help spread Dr. Wentz’s vision. Won’t you join me?

I dream of a world free from pain and suffering. I dream of a world free from disease. The USANA family will be the healthiest family on earth. Share my vision. Love life and live it to its fullest in happiness and health.

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Friday’s activities at the USANA International Convention consisted of a General Session in the morning and Training Stages in the afternoon. Having attended the early Training Stages Wednesday afternoon, there was some duplication this afternoon, so I allowed myself to head back to the hotel early. Of course, it was still a very long day, but not as long as Thursday, with the Awards Ceremony in the evening. I suppose I can catch up on sleep once I return home.

The General Session in the morning included the following highlights:

• Patti Roney – Ruby Director (1 step above Gold) – She has added a sixth item to her “Circle of Trust,” which underscores the integrity on which USANA has been founded:
  1. Dr. Wentz’s vision of “a world free from pain and suffering”
  2. The USANA products, themselves
  3. USANA’s commitment to the Children’s Hunger Fund
  4. Sanoviv Medical Institute in Baja California
  5. The freedom afforded by USANA’s award-winning compensation plan
  6. The Healthy Home book, about which I blogged earlier this year
• Dr. Alberto Peña – Sanoviv Medical Institute – Expecting to hear a health-related presentation, I was surprised at Dr. Peña’s network marketing orientation. He stated an oft repeated fact that the key to success is duplication. The key to duplication is to follow the KISS principle. Keep it simple! You don’t have to be a cellular microbiologist to have a successful USANA business. Besides which, we already have one: Dr. Myron Wentz. For myself, I have in fact picked up a wide variety of health information over the years, and yet I am still content to rely on Dr. Wentz as the authority behind the efficacy of these products. Back to Dr. Peña. Part of duplication is to rely on tools to do a lot of the work for you. One of the best tools we have at USANA is the Health & Freedom Solution. This is a series of videos that can be presented in a wide variety of formats (DVD, Web, email), greatly simplifying the presentation process. I hate to admit, but I bought the Health & Freedom Solution at last year’s Convention and have yet to install it. It will be one of the first things I do over Labor Day weekend.
• Germain Lafortune – Diamond Director (3 steps above Gold) – Germain used athletic imagery to describe a successful USANA Associate: someone with discipline, focus, and a well defined goal, just like an athlete. It is no wonder that so many Olympians and other world-class athletes trust their nutritional supplementation needs to USANA. Duplication does not mean creating mirror images of oneself. Finally, I was familiar with “SW SW SW N.” Germain expanded on this with “SWSWSWSW SW N,” which stands for “Some Will, Some Won’t, Some Wait, Some Whine … So What! Next!” It certainly puts the fear of rejection in its place.
• Jason Ryan Dorsey – The Gen Y Guy®– Jason’s keynote presentation was hilarious and insightful. Check out his website. In recent years, USANA has been attracting large teams of ambitious twenty-somethings. I commented recently to some business networking friends of mine how I would love to have some Gen Y’ers in my USANA business, and one of them assured me that I wanted nothing to do with them. Clearly he has not seen what I have. In many ways, the younger generation “gets it” more than the generations that came before them. Jason’s goal, through humor, is to teach business people how to work with Generation Y. One hint: Learn how to text! And contrary to the idea that young people can’t afford to start their own business, Gen Y spends $214 billion per year. They can afford to shell out the up-front cost for a USANA business, especially once they see what’s in it for them.
• Bud & Bunny Barth – 2-Star Diamond Directors (5 steps above Gold) – I have had the pleasure of hearing them speak in prior years, and they played very funny roles in some video spoofs of a home-makeover type TV show. Have you ever been given the no-time excuse? Well, Bud & Bunny definitely had no time when they joined USANA. They were already working long hours each day in their own business in Hollywood. But as Bud says, you still have to eat. They built a very successful USANA business over their lunch hours. They still own their studio (and probably always will), but now they have the luxury of working only on those assignments that fit into their more leisurely schedule.
• Jeremy Stansfield – 9-Star Diamond Director (12 steps above Gold) – Your USANA business is an asset that you can sell, will to your heirs, or set up in a living trust as he has. The reality is that large residual income checks are only the result of hard work and dedication. In the beginning we are definitely overworked and underpaid—a large reason why the “failure” rate in network marketing is so high. When people don’t make the millions they’ve been promised in the first two weeks, they jump ship and join the next fad opportunity. The only way you can fail in network marketing is if you give up. I don’t know if I’ll ever join the ranks of the Star Diamonds, but I am definitely shooting for Gold.
• Kevin Guest – USANA’s President North America – Kevin’s former video company showed him how fake most celebrities are. When the camera is turned off, they become completely different. Not so with Dr. Wentz. What you see is what you get. Kevin quoted Albert Einstein to describe Dr. Wentz: “Most people say that is it is the intellect which makes a great scientist.They are wrong: it is character.”
• Shawn Achor – author of The Happiness Advantage™– Yet another fabulous keynote presenter. (It’s no wonder that USANA’s International Conventions win awards!) Shawn loves escaping the cult of the average. As a psychology professor at Harvard, and now as a public speaker, he enjoys studying people who are quite high above the curve—positive outliers. Rather than bring them back to average, he prefers seeing them raise the curve. The absence of disease is not health. Instead of saying, “I’ll be happy when I am successful,” think, “How can I be happy now so that I can have more success?”

The afternoon had five Training Stages, of which I attended three. By Friday afternoon, my brain was getting quite full. Besides, having attended three Training Stages on Wednesday afternoon, before the “official” start of Convention, I was more than content with the presentations that I had already seen. Below are descriptions of these three.

• Shawn Achor– author of The Happiness Advantage™– Yes, his keynote presentation introduced a longer (45-minute) Training Stage, and I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. Smiles and yawns spread; so do stress and negativity. We are all connected by the “mirror neuron network.” Genetics sets the initial baseline, but we can learn any new behaviors. So yes, we can make long-term gains in our happiness. Common sense is not common action. Information is not transformation. If you can reduce “activation energy,” you can increase the likelihood of people taking action. An example he used was that of long email addresses. A shorter email address is more likely to be used. He presented five habits and invited us to choose one and try it out for the next 21 days:
  1. Three Gratitudes – Think of (better yet, write down) three things from the past 24 hours you are grateful for.
  2. Journaling – For two minutes each day, write down every detail about a positive experience from the past 24 hours.
  3. Exercise – Especially in the morning, it trains the brain to believe your behavior matters.
  4. Meditation – For two minutes each day, simply watch your breath going in and coming out. This improves focus.
  5. Random Acts of Kindness – First thing each morning write a 2-minute email to a friend or colleague. This builds social support.
• Dr. Denis Waitley – “The Winning Edge: How to Take Me and My Team to the Top” – Denis is a master of aphorisms. You don’t break habits, you replace them. Your self-worth will greatly influence your net worth. Replace entitlement with empowerment. See the person in the mirror as your leader. If it is to be, it’s up to me. You are your best social security provider. Take responsibility for the outcomes in your life. Give your children responsibilities as early as possible. There’s a gold mine in your goal mind. Team goals foster accountability. Deadlines counter procrastination and excuses. Setbacks are target corrections. Failure is fertilizer. Give more in use value than you receive in cash payment.
• Leanne Grechalk – “Creating Leaders & Advancing” – According to Jim Rohn, “Leadership is the challenge to be something above average.” Leanne gave several lists of great ideas for growing your USANA business. Two stood out to me. The first was Your Team’s Advancement Plan. Your team starts with you. Have a clear team vision. Create a culture of leadership and results. Results always (never excuses). Focus on the internal versus the external environment. And develop emotional intelligence. The other was three things to start your new Associates out right. First, insist that they complete the BDS eApprentice (an extensive online tutorial) within the first 72 hours. (This advice prompted me to start going through the eApprentice myself.) Have them call or text you when they are done. Then, have them commit to Platinum PaceSetter in their calendar. They have eight weeks to achieve this milestone, and it can have a huge impact on their future earnings (and yours). Finally, have them put the next International Convention in their calendar. Everything you do, say, and are with a new Associate will duplicate. Expect excellence from yourself and your team.

One more day of highlights to go. Stay tuned!

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I took another six pages of notes today, but I’ll blog about them tomorrow morning. Meanwhile here continue the highlights from Thursday’s Opening Session:

• Dr. Tim Wood – USANA’s Vice-president of Research and Development – His “Top Ten Amazing Facts about the Human Body” underscored the body’s need for the highest-quality building blocks. Every ten years we completely rebuild and remodel every bone in our body; children’s skeletons are rebuilt every year. Every three months we replace our blood supply, and every month our skin turns over. I’m glad there is so much science that goes into USANA’s products.

Between the morning and afternoon sessions, I attended one Training Stage titled The Art of Prospecting. Michelle Merriwether, USANA’s Vice-president of U.S. Field Development, was an energetic and entertaining presenter. Prospecting is the process of developing a list of names and sources of leads. According to Michelle, “Power prospecting is the art of networking, a way of starting new relationships and a way of developing and expanding your business anytime, anywhere, anyplace, anyone.” I took extensive notes of this 45-minute session, so I’ll save the rest for future blog posts.

The afternoon’s General Session included:

• Announcement – The U.S. Ski Team is now sponsored by USANA. More and more Olympic teams are choosing USANA for their nutritional supplementation needs. At the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, if Team USANA was a country, it would have come in third in overall medal count. In London in 2012, we are expecting Team USANA to come in first.
• Billie Jean King – Professional tennis player and founder of the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), of which USANA is now the official health supplement supplier – One quote of hers that stuck with me was, “Pressure is a privilege, and champions adapt and adjust.” And her mom wisely told her, “You gotta keep moving. If you stop moving, it’s over.”
• Announcement – USANA is once again featured in Success from Home magazine, on store shelves in September. I purchased a package of ten here at Convention, so if you can’t get your hands on one of these while they’re available in stores, just let me know.
• Lyle MacWilliam – Biochemist and founder of NutriSearch and The Comparative Guide to Nutritional Supplements – There’s a new 2011 Consumer Edition of The Comparative Guide, and a complete revision of the comprehensive Guide is coming next year. USANA leads with the science and not with marketing hype.
• Rudy Ruettiger – former Notre Dame football player and inspiration for the motion picture Rudy – I haven’t yet seen the movie Rudy, but we saw the last five minutes of it and it looks good. Rudy spoke one gem after another. Here are some I wrote down:
  • “You can change your thoughts right now.”
  • “One thought can change your life.”
  • “Do the right things and everyone will be attracted to you.”
  • “Persevere through the goofy thinkers.” (I shall start using this term.)
  • “Thank everyone who smiles. You’ll never know where they can lead you.”
  • “Never give up on someone who has talent and who has dreams.”

One of the speakers put up a famous quote by Aristotle. I had only seen the last part of it before, but I like it even more in context:

Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit. —Aristotle

This very full day was capped off by an inspiring Awards Ceremony. As has been the case in prior years, it was rather underattended. I suppose many people were burned out by such a full day of great speakers—and sitting on one’s butt for extended periods of time gets old fast. But with my current mindset of setting my sights on Gold, I asked myself, “What would a Gold Director do?” And the answer was clear: attend the Awards Ceremony. So I did.

There was a lot of well deserved recognition. As a choral singer, I was most delighted by their choice of musical entertainment for the evening: Rockapella. They are a five-man a cappella group that performs their own versions of a variety of musical styles. A complete list of Convention speakers and performers can be found here.

As always, I am so glad I found a way to make it here. I’ll be back next year, and this time I’ll be one of those walking across the stage at the Awards Ceremony.

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Yesterday was the “official” start of USANA’s 19^th annual International Convention, and there was one huge announcement made in the morning Opening Session. USANA is opening their 17^th and 18^th markets in the first quarter of 2012 in Belgium and France! USANA is unusually strong in the Asia-Pacific region, but I’ve been wondering when they were going to attack the European Union. We’ve been in the U.K. and the Netherlands for many years, but that’s all … until early next year. I can hardly wait. I have quite a few long-time friends in Europe, and I’ll be contacting them to let them know that USANA will soon be available (at least for purchase) throughout the EU.

I took four pages of notes yesterday, so I have much to write about in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, here are highlights of the day, starting with the morning Opening Session:

• Zak Ross – 10-Star Diamond Director (13 steps above Gold) – Zak’s mother, Collette Larsen, is unable to attend Convention this year because she is taking care of her daughter Sharlie undergoing a double lung and heart transplant. Your prayers are appreciated, and Sharlie’s blog can be found at sharliesangels.blogspot.com.
• Dr. Myron Wentz – USANA’s founder and the brains behind the science – Nine out of ten network marketing companies fail within their first year. In contrast, USANA is celebrating their 20^th anniversary next year. And among the top-tier network marketing companies, USANA is the fastest growing of this elite group. (Did I pick a winner, or what!)
• Dave Wentz – USANA’s CEO – USANA has achieved the FDA’s Drug Establishment Registration. This means that even the FDA recognizes that our products are manufactured to the most stringent pharmaceutical-grade standards.

I’m now realizing that, even giving just the highlights of yesterday’s events, this blog post will take me longer to write than I have time for this morning. So stay tuned, I’ll keep you posted with more later today.

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This and the next several posts will all have to do with USANA Health Sciences, the network marketing company that I am involved with. Often, when writing about network marketing, I try to keep my posts free of company references, so my readers who are involved in other opportunities can receive unconfused benefit from my writing. This being the annual USANA International Convention, however, company references are inescapable.

Also, as one of my goals in the coming year is to achieve the rank of Gold Director, I shall be making reference to various levels of achievement within USANA. Gold is a milestone for many reasons, which is why I have my eyes set on it. Currently I am at a level called Builder, and the next level up from there is Achiever, so my short-term goal is Achiever, and I’ll be sure to post once I have, er, achieved it.

I should mention that USANA’s conventions are top-notch events, and I wouldn’t miss one for the world. I joined USANA in October of 2002, a month too late to attend the 2002 convention, but I’ve been to every one since then. USANA’s International Conventions stand apart in that they have actually won awards. From a USANA press release dated June 22, 2010:

For the second year in a row, USANA Health Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: USNA) won an American Business Award for its 2009 International Convention in the Live Events category at The 2010 American Business Awards, also known as the 8^th Annual Stevie® Awards, in New York City Monday evening. This prestigious honor confirms that USANA, once again, organizes the Best Live Event in America.

For many, USANA’s annual International Convention starts on Thursday morning with the Opening Session. I always fly in on Tuesday, however, as I don’t want to miss any of the activities on Wednesday. Registration and the USANA Store opened at 9 a.m., and I prefer registering when the lines are short, not to mention seeing the new logowear before it gets all picked over.

The Training Stages started at 1 p.m., and I attended three very informative sessions in the “Road to Gold” track:

• Taking Action: Road to Gold – David Block – Are you ready to push your business to the next level? Gold Director David Block explains which steps are necessary for you to take your business to Gold. With proven techniques and honest advice, you’ll be reaching new heights in your business in no time.
• Creating Customers for Life – Dr. Peter Rugg – In today’s fast-changing and competitive environment, excellent customer service is essential for success. Let Scientific Advisory Council chairman Dr. Peter Rugg explain the important roles customers and customer service play in your business.
• Creating a Why That Will Lead Your Business to Success – Dr. Deborah Kern – It’s no secret that USANA’s top leaders work hard and have amazing discipline and commitment. But there is a secret you may not know about that helps them get up every morning, enthusiastic to sign up that new prospect or find another Preferred Customer. USANA Emerald Director Dr. Deborah Kern will tell you about how she is living her dream, and how having a strong why will help you get there too.

The program excerpts above should whet your appetite for some future posts, but for now I want to concentrate on my overall impressions of Convention.

The only activity I did not attend yesterday was the evening USANAfest at the Energy Solutions Arena. The Wednesday evening entertainment is fine, but I wanted to be sure to rest up for today’s very full schedule (about which I’ll blog tomorrow).

My biggest word of advice for anyone in network marketing is to let nothing stop you from attending your company’s big events. This is the single most important thing you can do to solidify your commitment to your company, accelerating the achievement of your goals.

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