I Found a Biz that Feels Like Home

Most of my blog posts are about network marketing in general, other business-related topics, my family and personal life, and news events or informational.  I have written only a few about my home business and why I love what I do, so I’m about due.

I have worked with Xpress Healthcare as an Affiliate Business Owner (ABO) since February 2011.  For six years prior to joining Xpress, I was with a competitor.  The way my former company was managed, performed their training and operated their business was not a good fit for me.  There are people who were successful with them, so the business model works for some. 

The founders of Xpress Healthcare, Ed Pettola and Dan Gambardello, founded Xpress in 2009.  They spent a year or so building the business, putting the programs in place and creating a great foundation.  In 2010, they launched their network marketing platform.

• The discount healthcare plan was their first product.  It is NOT insurance.  The plan does not make payments directly to the providers of medical services.  Our plan members pay for all their own healthcare services, but they pay discounted rates, saving between 10% - 85% on virtually all their medical expenses.  Their physician and hospital bills are reduced, and they can receive discounts on lab tests and imaging (X-rays, MRI’s), diabetic and medical supplies, chiropractic and even a nurse line. 

• After a short time, Xpress Healthcare added another product, a discount dental plan, which also includes discounts on vision, prescriptions, hearing, medical supplies, diabetic supplies and vitamins.

• More plans were added at the beginning of 2012.  Xpress now also offers discounts on Pet Care, Roadside Assistance, Legal, LifeLock® and a Cash Back Rewards program.

• Xpress recently added a Telahealth program, the first and largest doctors-by-phone service in the US.

• Xpress Healthcare plans start at only $19.95/month (per immediate family).  Our plans can save our members hundreds, even thousands of dollars, and in many cases, they are able to gain access to care that, without our plans, they may never have had.  But please remember, we are NOT insurance.  We are a DISCOUNT benefit company.

Now, back to my career with Xpress.  Within a few weeks after joining Xpress, my income covered my monthly affiliate fee.  After a few months with Xpress, I was asked to host some of our nationwide corporate training calls.  It was both an honor to be chosen and a responsibility about which I was nervous, but I accepted the challenge. 

I grew my business, each month increasing my residual income and growing my team a little larger.  My team, “The Winner’s Circle,” is now one of the largest teams in the company.  My team is pretty typical for the network marketing industry. I have team members who are serious about their business and are doing as I did, working hard and consistently increasing their income.  I have team members who are slowly working their business and growing their income little by little.  And I have team members who have done absolutely nothing!

I am now seeking more leaders, people who are coachable, able to work both as part of a team and independently, who do not need their hand held every step of the way, and who are self-motivated.  I’ll will train them, guide them and help grow them grow their businesses.

If you think you qualify to become an Xpress Healthcare leader, visit my website to learn more about Xpress Healthcare. 

Are you ready to join my team? If so, go to http://joinxpresshealthcare.com.  Click on “join,” and select “Become an ABO.”

I’m looking forward to working with you soon.

Follow the Leader

I really don’t understand it.  I am pretty successful with my Xpress Healthcare business, not a six-figure earner (yet), but I’m making a living.  Why then, when team members ask for help and I direct them to particular sites to promote their business, do they either totally ignore me or only partially follow my suggestion.

I operate nearly my entire business online.  I don’t advertise on sites specifically meant for placing ads.  I have had little success with them. 

I have built my business using relationship marketing.  Among other networking sites, I participate on IBOToolbox.  I use a few sites, but I have had the best results from using IBOToolbox and a forum site where work-at-home business owners share ideas, ask questions and discuss myriad subjects, some having nothing to do with business.  Both IBOToolbox and the other forum I use a great deal offer ways to post ads at no cost, and I always have ads running on those sites.

I train my team members through twice-a-week team calls and using one-on-one training.  Once again, a new team member joined my team yesterday who found me on one of these forums.  I have signed more new team members from that one site than from anywhere else.  I use IBO as much for the relationships I have built as I do for promoting my business.  I have no one of knowing how many people see my posts, or those of my posts that other IBO members share elsewhere, and eventually end up joining.  I do know, however, that I get lots of traffic, because of IBOToolbox.

So, with that said, I’ll return to my original question.  I consistently advice my team members to join and participate on those two sites in particular.  I use others too, but not nearly as much, and team members sometimes find forums they enjoy.  I tell the team straight out, “I have signed more team members from that one site than from anywhere else or any other type of advertising.” 

IBOToolbox is great as well, and I remind team members about using it all the time.  One of my new team members actually listened, following my directions on how to use it, and she signed her first team member yesterday – someone who found her on IBO!

That old slogan comes up again here, “You can lead a horse to water…”  I simply want the best for my team.  I want them to grow strong, successful Xpress Healthcare businesses.  And yet only a fraction of my team participates in either of these two amazing business promoting forums.  Oh well, all I can do is show them the way, and I will continue to do so.

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Learn how you can Save Money on Your Health and Dental Costs AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more athttp://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).

To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com. 

Be Thankful

I read the following article and poem in a TOPS News Magazine (November 2012 issue).  The magazine said the author is unknown.  It is inspiring, and I’d like to share it with you.

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Be thankful that you don’t already have everything you desire.

If you did, what would there be to look forward to?

Be thankful when you don’t know everything, for it gives you the opportunity to learn.

Be thankful for the difficult times.

During those times, you grow.

Be thankful for your limitations, because the give you opportunities for improvement.

Be thankful for each new challenge, because it will build your strength and character.

Be thankful for your mistakes.  They will teach you valuable lessons.

Be thankful when you’re tired and weary, because it means you’ve made a difference,

I would like to challenge for all who read this to think about why you are thankful.  Make five categories – physical, emotional, spiritual, financial and social – and see how many reasons you can come up in each category with for being thankful.

I’m sure we all have many reasons why we are thankful.  Now, it’s time to discover yours!

If anyone would like to do so, once you’ve written out why you are thankful, share them, one-by-one on the IBOToolbox wall.

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Learn how you can Save Money on Your Health and Dental Costs AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more at http://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).

To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com.  

Genealogy Trip to BC

I have written about some of my genealogy research in the past.  I wanted to share one of the interesting “finds” my husband and I found yesterday.

We began exploring a particular branch of my husband’s family a few weeks ago.  They live in the South.  We’ve seen pictures of his great grandparents.  They could have posed for the painting “American Gothic.”  In the last hundred years or so, his ancestors have definitely been “hicks.”

We logged onto ancestry.com and began our search of the name Morgan. Over the past month or so, we discovered that, through his Morgan branch, my husband is related to Princess Diana and her sons, Humphrey Bogart, Daniel Boone and Sir Henry Morgan.  Henry Morgan reportedly was a pirate, and you’ll see his picture on bottles of Morgan’s Rum.  Springfield, Massachusetts has a statue erected of Miles Morgan, one of my husband’s ancestors.

We began yesterday’s journey through history where Martha Morgan married Joseph Perkins (both of whom are my husband’s 5^th cousin, 9 times removed).  We found that many others have researched the Morgan family, and there are dozens of trees completed and shared on ancestry.com.  Some had conflicting information, and they cited no sources for their information.

We looked at several trees until we found one that had written out phenomenal sources.  His search, apparently, was done in libraries, churches and government records.  The majority of my research is done online, because I don’t have the time or money to travel the world seeking records.  His records are public, so I used them, stating that he was the source.

So, we began using this one particular tree to see how his information matched ours and whether it went any further back in history than ours.  We began by selecting Martha Morgan’s father, and then we chose her grandfather.  We continued clicking on the father of each person we brought up.  We were excited when it kept going back further and further and the family members were from Wales.

After about 10 generations back, their last names disappeared.  They were not missing.  Last names are a relatively new thing.  In ancient times, for instance, my name would have been Julie daughter of Saul.  Everyone’s name ended with son of or daughter of ________.

We continued our travels back in time, and the names became so strange, that I really had to concentrate to spell them correctly in my records.  How about Lughaidh Sriabhn Dearg mac Fineamhas?  Or, Pedur ap Cyngar.  (Ap means son of; verch means daughter of.) Pedur’s father was Cyngar ap Gwrthefyr. 

Well, little by little, we went further and further back in history. The family went from Wales to Ireland.  We were soon at double-digit years of birth, and then single-digit years.  Can you imagine being born in the year 7?

It took several hours, but the tree finally did come to an end.  The earliest person we found was born before 142 BC in Ireland, and he died in 130 BC.  BC!  Can you imagine how long it took for this guy to trace the history for this family tree?  His sources were volume upon volume of books, many history books, bibles, church records, and government records.  It must have taken him many years to complete.

We did find a few, but very few errors in his records.  For instance, one person died at the age of nine, leaving behind a wife and two children.  Or individuals who were born years after their father died.  One woman had children starting when she was six years old. I’ll have to contact the author to notify him.

My husband’s Morgan line includes many Kings, Lords and Knights.  It was a very exciting journey through history.  And my husband’s descendants are recorded back to the year 142 BC!

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Learn how you can Save Money on Your Health and Dental Costs AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more at http://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).

To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com. 

Women and Heart Attacks

I received an email a while back with some important information. I'd like to share it with you.  I did not write this, but I don’t know who did since it had apparently been forwarded many times.

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Nurse has heart attack and describes what women feel when having one.....

I am an ER nurse, I was aware that female heart attacks were different, but this is the best description I've ever read. Please read this and pass it on.

Women rarely have the same dramatic symptoms that men have, the sudden stabbing pain in the chest, the cold sweat, grabbing the chest & dropping to the floor that we see in movies. Here is the story of one woman's experience with a heart attack. 

I had a heart attack at about 10:30 PM with NO prior exertion; NO prior emotional trauma that one would suspect might have brought it on. I was sitting snugly & warm on a cold evening with my cat purring in my lap, reading an interesting story my friend had sent me and thinking, A-A-h, this is the life, all cozy and warm with my feet propped up.

Then I felt that awful sensation of indigestion, when you've been in a hurry and grabbed a bite of sandwich and washed it down with a dash of water; you feel as though you’ve swallowed a golf ball going down the esophagus in slow motion. This was my initial sensation, but I hadn't eaten since about 5:00 p.m.

After it seemed to subside, the next sensation was like little squeezing motions that seemed to be racing up my SPINE (hind-sight, it was probably aorta spasms), gaining speed as they continued racing up and under my sternum (breast bone, where one presses rhythmically when administering CPR).

This process continued on into my throat and branched out into both jaws. 'AHA!! NOW I stopped puzzling about what was happening. We all have read and/or heard about pain in the jaws being one of the signals of an MI happening, haven't we? I said aloud, “I think I'm having a heart attack!”

I lowered the foot rest dumping the cat from my lap, started to take a step and fell on the floor instead. I thought to myself, if this is a heart attack, I shouldn't be walking into the next room where the phone is or anywhere else... but, if I don't, nobody will know that I need help. If I wait any longer, I may soon be unable to get up.

I pulled myself up with the arms of the chair, walked slowly into the next room and dialed the Paramedics... I told her I thought I was having a heart attack based on the symptoms. I just stated the facts. She said she was sending the Paramedics over immediately, asked if the front door was near to me, and if so, to un-bolt the door and then lie down on the floor where they could see me when they came in.

I unlocked the door, got on the floor and lost consciousness. I don't remember the medics coming in, their examination, lifting me onto a gurney or getting me into their ambulance. I woke up briefly when we arrived and saw that the radiologist was there in his surgical blues and cap, helping the medics pull my stretcher out of the ambulance. He was bending over me asking questions, but I couldn't make my mind interpret what he was saying to answer. I nodded off again, not waking up until the cardiologist had threaded the teeny angiogram balloon up my femoral artery into the aorta and into my heart where he installed 2 side by side stints to hold my right coronary artery open.

You may believe all my thinking and actions at home took 20-30 minutes.  It was actually only 4-5 minutes before I called the Paramedics.  Both the fire station and St Jude Hospital are only minutes away from my home, and my Cardiologist was in his scrubs, ready to go to the OR to get my heart restarted (which had stopped somewhere between my arrival and the procedure) and install stents.

I have written all this detail, because I want all of you to know what I learned.
1. Be aware that something very different is happening in your body, not the usual men's symptoms, but inexplicable things happening (until my sternum and jaws got into the act). It is said that many more women than men die of their first (and last) MI because they didn't know they were having one.  They commonly mistake it as indigestion.  Your symptoms might not be exactly like mine, so I advise you to call the Paramedics if ANYTHING unpleasant is happening that you've not felt before. It is better to have a 'false alarm' visit than risk your life guessing what it might be!

2. Note that I said, “Call the Paramedics.”   If you can, take an aspirin. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!

Do NOT try to drive yourself to the ER - you are a hazard to others on the road.
Do NOT have your panicked husband who will be speeding and looking anxiously at what's happening with you instead of the road.
Do NOT call your doctor.  He doesn't carry the equipment in his car that you need to be saved! The Paramedics do, principally OXYGEN that you need ASAP. Your Dr. will be notified later.

3. Don't assume it couldn't be a heart attack because you have a normal cholesterol count. Elevated cholesterol is rarely the cause of an MI (unless it's unbelievably high and/or accompanied by high blood pressure). MIs are usually caused by long-term stress and inflammation in the body, which dumps all sorts of deadly hormones into your system to sludge things up in there. Pain in the jaw can wake you from a sound sleep. Be careful and aware; the more we know the better chance we will survive.

If everyone who reads this sends it to 10 people, we'll likely save at least one life.  Please be a true friend and send this article to all your friends (male & female) who you care about!

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Learn how you can Save Money on Your Health and Dental Costs AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more at http://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).

To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com.  

Ask Not What Your Country Can Do for You…

I was in high school during John F. Kennedy’s Presidency.  I was not very aware of politics at that time, but I admired him as a man.  I cried and watched TV coverage for days about his death and funeral.  Kennedy was a brilliant man, and the following JFK quotes tell a great deal about him. 

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.

I am certain that after the dust of centuries has passed over our cities, we, too, will be remembered not for victories or defeats in battle or in politics but for our contributions to the human spirit.

Victory has a thousand fathers but defeat is an orphan.

Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.

We stand for freedom. That is our conviction for ourselves; that is our only commitment to others.

We must use time as a tool, not as a crutch.

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.

So, let us not be blind to our differences - but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved.

We need men who can dream of things that never were.

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.

Liberty without learning is always in peril; learning without liberty is always in vain.

For in the final analysis, our most basic common link, is that we all inhabit this small planet, we all breathe the same air, we all cherish our children`s futures, and we are all mortal.

The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining.

Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.

Let us never negotiate out of fear. But, let us never fear to negotiate.

Mankind must put an end to war before war puts an end to mankind.

Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future.

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To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com. 

Learn how you can Save Money on Your Health and Dental Costs AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more at http://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).

How to Grow a Strong Business

There are several questions about network marketing that we are asked by prospects repeatedly.  Here are a few.

   Can I get rich quickly by joining a network marketing company?

It takes time, effort and patience to build a network marketing business. Network marketing is about building residual income.  You must consistently sell your products or services.  With Xpress, you must sell quite a few plans before you’ll notice a difference in your wallet.  Time and effort. IF you want an override income from others, you must also build a team of people who will also put in time and effort to enable you to earn more money. 

However, in order to gain true residual income, you need to be patient.  The good thing is it takes far less time to build a network marketing business, and a much smaller investment than traditional businesses or franchises.  They need huge investments up front and usually are not in profit mode for at least a year.  With most network marketing companies,  you’re in profit mode once you are earning enough to cover your up-front or monthly fee.

   Some ask, “Isn’t your warm market your best lead prospect?”

Your warm market is the people you know – those who trust you and you have a relationship with. Many companies do recommend that you contact them first.  I disagree. Our friends and family get very tired of being approached to join one business or another or buy this great new product. 

So, we must start connecting with people we don’t know, both online and offline. The key to connecting with people offline is simply talking to them. Ask them questions and listen to the answers. If you get them talking enough, you will hear their “why” to tie in with your company’s solution. Get their contact information and set an appointment to talk to them about your business.

A few key principles are required to succeed in Network Marketing, and regardless of the company you are with, they will determine whether or not you will be successful.

Know what you want to accomplish!  Take the time to really think about what you want to accomplish and why. At first countless ideas are going through your head thinking of all the possibilities of success and potential financial growth that awaits you; it’s easy to get excited.  After a while, though, it can be just as easy to become discouraged if your business isn’t growing as fast as you expected.

Having a very clear “why” and knowing what you want to accomplish is important at those times.  Then, no matter what you face, you have the motivation to press beyond the challenges and get closer to your goals.  Write down your Why! Keep it posted where you can see it daily. If it helps you, make a dream board with pictures that represent your why.  Keep them posted on the fridge where you’ll see them and be reminded of your “why” several times a day.

What are you willing to give up to reach your goals?  You must be willing to sacrifice for a period of time. Many people underestimate their need to give up a few things in order to succeed.  Success does not happen by mistake.  It requires some level of compromise.

You may have to miss your favorite TV show or not work on your hobby for a while to allow yourself time to grow your business.  Determine what you are willing to compromise up front to enable you to achieve your goals in the end. 

Take a look at your life. Where are you wasting time? How often do you have the TV on when you could be working on your business? Make a list specifying exactly what times/things you will temporarily sacrifice in order to build your business.

Have a plan & work it!  If you want to really grow a strong business, you must know how much you want to earn, and what it will take to earn it; what are the Income Producing Activities, and what should you be doing daily to get closer and closer to your goals?  Write down how much you want to earn and what you need to do to get there. Write down exactly how you will get to your goal. Then write down daily goals.

I hope these suggestions help those considering network marketing.  Knowing what is required before you take the leap may make a huge difference as to whether you are a network marketing success.

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To learn about Julie Klein and the Xpress Healthcare Business Opportunity, please visit http://joinxpresshealthcare.com. 

Learn how you can reduce the high cost of health care and dental services AND Save on Hearing, Vision, Prescriptions, Roadside Assistance, Lifelock™ and much more athttp://ibourl.net/XpressSavings   (NOT insurance).