Thank you for visiting Mommy Lynn Blog. My name is Lynn and I am from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The above is a picture me.
I am a full time housewife and I am running my own home based business.
What is my story?
I’ve started a home based business using the network marketing business model back in December 2017.
In March 2018, my husband and I decided to be serious in building the business.
As of today, our home business is now our full time career.
We’ve achieved a significant level of success.
From renting a small single story house, we now own a large freehold landed property that we bought from the income generated from our home business.
With the income from our home business, we have also travelled to countries such as:
- Hokkaido, Japan
- Melbourne, Australia
- Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE)
- Osaka, Japan
- Seoul, South Korea
- Taipei, Taiwan
- Hong Kong & Macau
- Perth, Australia
- Shanghai, Hangzhou & Suzhou, China
- Tokyo, Japan
In this article, I thought of sharing my experience speaking to an expat that came to Malaysia though the Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) program.
Staying in Malaysia
A few days ago, I met a lady that came to Malaysia from the United Kingdom (UK) with her family.
Her name is Jenny.
Jenny and her husband are in their late thirties and they have a 6 years old son.
She told me they came to Malaysia and staying permanently here through the Malaysia My Second Home program.
They are currently renting a condominium at Desa Park City, Kuala Lumpur and will be moving to their new condominium soon when the renovation work has been completed.
Jenny contacted me after reading one of the article in this blog.
Since I am staying near to Desa Park City, Jenny and I met for coffee in a nearby shopping mall.
As we were chatting, I got to know Jenny better.
She told me she used to work with an investment bank in the UK.
She held a senior position with her previous company and was paid quite a high salary.
I asked her why she decided to leave her high paying job and come to Malaysia.
She told me one of the reasons was due to her work stress.
But the main reason why Jenny and her husband came to Malaysia was because of her son.
She didn’t like the education system in the UK and she wanted to give a better education option for her son.
That is why Jenny and her husband made the decision to come to Malaysia.
They applied for the MM2H program a few years ago and recently received the official approval.
Jenny and her husband also bought a condominium at Desa Park City which is not far from where they are currently staying.
Because the MM2H program does not allow the applicant to work in Malaysia, Jenny and her husband are now living off their personal savings and income from their investments.
However, since Jenny and her husband will be staying in Malaysia for long term, they are looking for a business that they can operate in Malaysia.
That was the reason Jenny contacted me.
She wanted to know if she and her husband can be part of the business I am doing.
I told Jenny that my husband and I are building a network marketing business and this type of business is not for everyone.
Jenny told me she joined a direct selling company before when she was in the UK but only as a product user.
She has never tried to build a MLM business because she was busy with her work.
Now that she and her husband are in Malaysia without employment, they can consider building a network marketing business here.
Network marketing for MM2H expats
Jenny asked me can a foreigner staying in Malaysia long term through the MM2H program start a network marketing business here?
I told her, Yes, of course!
The company that my husband and I partnered with has a “One World One Account” model.
Meaning, the business is open to everyone from around the world.
She can register as member account by using her passport.
Since she is holding a UK passport, she can register a Malaysia membership and do her business in the Malaysian Ringgit (RM) currency.
Since Jenny and her husband have been approved for the MM2H program, they can open a Malaysia bank account.
Any commission and bonuses generated from her network marketing business will be paid to her Malaysia bank account.
Jenny was very happy to hear that 🙂
She asked me why there aren’t more expats that came to Malaysia through MMH2 program doing network marketing here?
I told her I am not sure.
Maybe they haven’t explore the Malaysia direct selling industry in more detailed yet.
Malaysia direct selling industry
In this section, I thought of sharing some information about the direct selling industry in Malaysia that many people do not know.
Firstly, how big is the direct selling industry in Malaysia?
According to the World Federation of Direct Selling Associations (WFDSA), a leading international, non-governmental, voluntary organization representing the global direct selling industry in more than 170 countries fact sheet, Malaysia was ranked number 6 globally in term of total sales generated.
For the year 2023, the total sales from the Malaysia direct selling industry was USD9.503 billion!
As per the statistic from WFDSA, the top 10 direct selling markets in the world are:
1) United States of America (USA)
2) Germany
3) South Korea
4) China
5) Japan
6) Malaysia
7) Brazil
8) Mexico
9) France
10) Taiwan
The above is a list of top 15 direct selling markets as per WFDSA.
As you can see in the list above, Malaysia is at the number 6 position.
The Malaysia direct selling market is on par with Japan!
Direct selling in Malaysia has a lot of potential due to its large size.
Getting started
How can an expat like Jenny that came to Malaysia through the MM2H program start a network marketing business?
Firstly, she would need a local sponsor to help her to register a member account.
Starting a network marketing business does not requirement high capital.
The member registration fee is only RM60.00.
There is also no need to keep stock because the product fulfilment and delivery to your customers uses the dropshipping business model.
“Dropshipping is a business model where items bought from an online store are shipped directly to customers by the supplier or manufacturer.”
For someone who is new to building a network marketing business, what you need to focus on is the “marketing” part of your business.
You need to know how to generate leads for your business.
My husband and I are well versed in internet and social marketing and we use this method to generate leads for our network marketing business.
One thing that I’ve learnt in my journey in building a network marketing business is the importance of building a personal brand.
Standing out from the crowd
Do you know how many direct selling companies are in operation in Malaysia?
There are thousand of direct selling companies operating in Malaysia.
Some has license to operate a direct sale business in the country.
Many more do not have license and are illegal.
The well-capitalised legal direct sales companies are member of the Direct Selling Association of Malaysia (DSAM).
The last I counted, there were more than 130 companies who are a member of DSAM.
Each of the DSAM member would have tens of thousands of distributors.
What I am trying to say is there are a lot of MLM distributors in Malaysia.
How do you stand out from the crowd?
One way of doing so is by creating a strong “Personal Branding” for your MLM business.
Yes, similar to companies create brands to help people recognise and trust them, professional network marketers can do the exact same thing.
Why you need Personal Branding
As a professional network marketer, your income relies on other people believing what you say.
If the people around you do not believe you, it is unlikely you will be able to recruit anyone into your business.
If you can’t recruit, you are just another struggling direct seller in the industry.
The company you’ve partnered with might have a great product, but if you don’t have trust, you will not be able to sell any product.
As an expat in Malaysia, it is even more important for you to create trust with your prospects or audience.
If you cannot sell or move product, you don’t have a business.
You need to give your prospect and the people around you a reason to believe in YOU as the business, not the product or the company.
You need to create trust and credibility.
A strong and credible personal brand can help to establish you as an authority.
It does not really matter what product you are selling.
If the product is good, people will buy it once or twice.
Selling product only is not going to generate much profit.
What you want is to leverage on the concept of “people franchising” in a MLM business.
You want to duplicate yourself.
If other words, you want to find other people to do what you are doing.
The people in your network can be other expats in Malaysia or Malaysians as well.
You can sponsor them to be part of your team.
What should you do to create a personal brand in MLM?
What are the qualities and characteristics that will help you to connect with people, build trust and influence them to join your team?
Here are 3 things for you to consider.
1. Your personal brand should be relevant to your target audience.
Who are your target demographic?
If the product of your business is make up and skin care, then you should focus your personal branding towards women.
Who are the women in your audience and what do they need?
Create an avatar of the ideal person you want to reach.
2. Your personal brand should be based on who you are.
In the age of social media, how you portray yourself online has to be thought out carefully.
It is not simply about being yourself.
To create a personal brand in network marketing, you have to merge your personality with your MLM business and come out with a brand that is appealing to your target audience.
3. Remember, your brand is always on display.
If you have a TikTok channel, Facebook page or Instagram account that you use for your business, you have to be mindful of what you post, like or share.
Your online activities should be consistent with your personal brand voice.
Developing your personal brand
How do you develop your personal brand?
In the following section, I will share some tips.
To develop your personal brand, the most important is “consistency”.
If you are projecting yourself as a certain type of person, it will be disturbing if you were to do things that is not consistent with your brand you’ve created.
If you are a family oriented woman, the content you publish should be family oriented.
If you were to publish a picture of yourself drinking and partying, that is not consistent with your personal brand and will confuse your audience.
Next, to develop your personal brand, you can make yourself valuable to your target audience.
If you are selling health supplement, then it is important for people to see you as an expert in the area of health supplementation.
To offer value to your audience, you would have to invest time and effort to educate yourself in your field.
You have to read or attend courses to increase your knowledge.
With all the knowledge that you’ve gained, determine which information and topics that are most helpful to your target audience.
What you are trying to do is to educate them about what you’ve learned.
You should also share information from others that your target audience might find interesting or useful.
What does all of this do?
First and foremost it turns you into an authority.
When you educate and share your knowledge in your field of expertise, you are seen as a Key Opinion Leader (KOL).
By doing so, you are building your personal brand and demonstrating your worth to your audience.
When you are providing useful information, you show people who are interested in your product or your business opportunity that you know your stuff.
When you are positioning yourself as an authority or KOL, people will more likely to trust and believe you.
More effective follow-up
When you’ve developed a strong personal brand, you will move from being a “hunter” to a “hunted”.
Let me explain.
When you are building a multi level marketing (MLM) business, you’ll know what the fortune is in the follow up.
However…NOTHING could be further from the truth.
Now, I know what you’re thinking…
“But Lynn, you never know when your prospect will be ready to buy or join, so you’ve got to follow-up closely!”
But here’s the problem with this approach.
Chasing after your prospects makes you look desperate.
Basically, you’re giving up your power and giving it to them.
Which, as you might have guessed, is not a good position.
If you want to be viewed as an authority or leader, do not project yourself as a desperate person.
Leaders don’t chase people.
They’re the ones who get chased by people.
There is a big difference.
This is the difference between asking people to join you versus having them approach you first, desperately asking to work with you.
As you’d imagine, most network marketers are in the first group.
They’re constantly hounding their prospects, hoping and praying they’ll join.
I know, because that used to be me.
Needless to say, that’s a recipe for frustration and burn out.
Luckily there’s a better way.
With a little shift in your approach by first creating a strong personal branding is how you position yourself and have people eagerly reaching out to you.
Asking how they can buy your products and join your team.
When you go from being the “hunter” to being the “hunted”, building a network marketing business becomes a LOT more fun, exciting, and, most importantly, way more profitable.
Thank you for reading this article and I hope it has been helpful for you.
Are you an expat staying in Malaysia long term through the MM2H program?
Are you looking for a low cost and low risk business opportunity?
If you are, please click on the link below to contact me on WhatsApp and we can have a discussion on how we can work together.
Leave A Comment