SUCCESS STORY
An Upline Interview with Miyuki and John Edwards of Royal BodyCare
Miyuki and John Edwards have always been a hard-working couple-- before Network Marketing, Miyuki was caring for their three children full-time, while John was working for the government as an environmental health and pest control specialist. He was also running his own pest control company at the same time. It all started one day when John was on a house call and saw some interesting products on his customer's counter. This customer happened to be Johnny Keller, a top leader in Royal BodyCare....
John: I started out simply as a product user based on what Johnny Keller, who is now one of our mentors, and his wife told me about Royal BodyCare. I used the products for about 13 months before Miyuki said to me one day, "You know, John, I think I might want to start getting back into something, with the kids going back to school." We discussed the possibility of Network Marketing with Royal BodyCare, and that was the first time we started to seriously consider a Networking business.
I flew out to the company headquarters in Vancouver just to check it out and meet the
scientists, and when I came back, we started approaching people a little bit. Royal BodyCare offers a home business school twice a year, so I talked with Miyuki about going there while I watched the kids.
Miyuki: I'd begun to change my mind and didn't want to go. But since John had offered to watch the kids for the weekend, I figured I'd go, but skip class and hang out at the pool instead.
In the end, I did go to the classes, and came back on fire. John came downstairs one day, and the office had been rearranged, I was working, I was answering the phone. I was just so excited, and that was when the business really started taking off. Both of our passions clicked together and we started working as a team.
John: The biggest challenge for me in the beginning was overcoming my preconceived ideas about Network Marketing. It took checking out the company for myself and working with Johnny Keller, for me to start to understand Network Marketing as a serious business.
I'm also still running my company and working for the government, so with so little time, we've had to make some sacrifices. When people say, "Let's do this" or "Let's do that," we've had to decline in order to stay focused.
Miyuki: Working at home is one of the great aspects of Network Marketing, but no one told me how hard it would be with children. I was intertwining business and family, and it was becoming really stressful.
So I had to discipline myself. John and I gave up eating out, and things like that, and hired a baby-sitter between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. so that I could focus and then cut the business off between 2 p.m. and when the children went to bed.
John: One of the most important things we've done for our business is really focus on developing ourselves-- if you don't develop yourself, people aren't going to be attracted to you no matter how great your company may be. People watch you. That's one of the reasons that Miyuki and I have done so well, even though it hasn't always been easy. We use our strengths-- she has her strengths, I have mine, and we balance each other. I feel very fortunate to have that partnership, and it's something we definitely had to work at.
We have no prior experience in Network Marketing, so we've made some mistakes, but our attitude has always been "Let's try it." Some things worked, some things didn't, but we never stopped. We get together with other people and brainstorm, because it's not just about what we know, it's about what everybody knows, and we can learn from anyone.
We always had our vision, and if we hadn't stayed focused on that, people would have stolen our dreams. So now we're at the top of the company because we didn't let anybody steal our dream-- instead, we made them part of it! We have fun.
Miyuki: I think we've been successful in part because we've been willing to do things that a lot of people won't do, even when we didn't want to either. That's doing those little things, pushing ourselves a little more. Johnny Keller has really challenged us, and we've accepted his challenges.
For example, he'd ask us without warning to get up on stage and open a meeting-- we'd do it. He'd ask us to lead conference calls when we'd never done that before, and we'd give it our best effort.
Another key to our success is passion. We are so enthusiastic and serious about this business that people can feel that we are sincere even over the phone. They can tell that we really mean what we say. We always tell the truth and say, "We've never built a Network Marketing business before, but here's what we've been able to do here."
John: Our success philosophy is what Jerry Clark calls the "rainbow rule": Do unto others as they want to be done unto. We always try to relate to people on the human level, to really listen to what they have to say and put ourselves in their shoes as much as possible.
Miyuki: I have a simple success philosophy to add, and that's to share! Share what you know with everybody, share acknowledgment freely, share your resources, share your time and your friendship. We tithe back to the business by helping other people build their businesses, by matching the time they're willing to invest. We want our product users and business builders alike to know that we're here for them.
John: The best thing about this business to me is that I'm going to retire in three years and have the rest of my life to spend with our children. You have to know who you are to know where you can go, and that's why the personal development side of this business is so important. Our vision is to do what we want, when we want to and feel good about it. And we're going to have it-- we don't believe, we know, and that's one step beyond belief.
Miyuki: It's having a lifestyle made up purely of choices.
MIYUKI AND JOHN EDWARDS are full-time Crown distributors with Royal BodyCare, Network Marketers of super foods and nutritional supplements. They've been building their business for just over a year and live with their three children, Allan, 8, Derek, 6, and Misa, 5, in Chesapeake, Virginia.
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Reprinted with permission from Upline, Edwards-Success Story-October 1998, 888-UPLINE-1, http://www.upline.com
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