The Beginner’s Guide to Direct Sales Planning

Today I’m going to show you how to create a planner to help you run your direct sales business better.

I remember when I joined my first direct sales company. I was (and am) still working a full-time job. My direct sales business was a fun side hustle, but I obviously wanted it to be profitable as well. I was overwhelmed with all the things that I was being told that I needed to do: social media marketing, email campaigns, parties and events, team trainings, corporate trainings, and more!

If you’re just getting started with your direct sales business, or even if you’re a pro but are looking for better ways to plan out your business, then you’re in the right place. In this guide, I’m going to show you the options you have for building your own direct sales planner and give you insights on how I personally use them to grow my business.

So what kinds of things do you need to plan for your DS business?

We talked about a few of them already, but let’s add to that list a bit:

Customer Communication
Parties & Events
Social Media
Team Building
Goals
Finances

Want to start with a ready-made bundle?

It can be overwhelming to start a direct sales business. I’m going to provide quite a few options of things you can use to help you plan your business, but if you want to start with just the basics, our Direct Sales Insert Bundle is a great choice! It comes with three of the inserts that I’ve mentioned here, plus some fun stickers as an added bonus item. Just add your favorite cover and this insert bundle for a great start to your Direct Sales Planner!

This bundle includes the following inserts:

Goals & Finances
Contact Customers
Parties & Events

I do recommend that you use an XL Cover for your DS Planner, but that is 100% personal preference. The XL is 7″ x 9.75″ and is perfect for any small business. I do carry mine in my tote, but it also looks great on my desk!

The fortune is in the follow up.

You’ve heard that saying before, I’m sure. I absolutely believe that it’s true for any business, direct sales or otherwise. When you’re building your direct sales planner, follow up needs to be one area to make sure is captured.

I personally use the Grades Insert to track my customer follow ups. It is an easy visual for me to see when someone placed an order, what types of products they ordered, and what follow up messages I have sent to them. This also makes an easy reference for me to see when I should make suggestions for future purchases (think refills).

The Customer Contact Insert is something to consider adding as well. I like to use this as a method of capturing contact information when I am working at events. Order it in the medium size along with a deskpad planner and you’ve got a ready-made contact form to put on your table. You can make notes as to where you met the person and then do your follow-ups once you get home! Consider having a giveaway of some sort at your table, and give them an extra entry if they fill out their contact info here! Just make sure your new PenGems pen doesn’t walk away with them!

All about the parties!

Speaking of events, most direct sales companies have a party platform to help you share your products with more people. If you’ve been to one of my workshops, then you know I typically run multi-host events on a singular date in a given month.

I use the Parties & Notes Insert to keep track of information for each of my hostesses, including the built-in party checklist, which includes hostess packets, guest lists, follow up, thank you’s and more! There’s even a place to track games that you might play in your party! I use the notes insert to keep up with which guests belong to which hostess, as well as party prizes they might have earned.

Alternatively, if you do a lot of events as well as parties, you might prefer the Parties & Events Insert, which is a bit more generic (and is part of the Insert Bundle I’m going to tell you about in a bit). Using inserts like this is a great way for you to track your sales at various parties and events to see what was successful and what was a flop. Listen, we all have a party that flops at some point. When that happens, take a step back and evaluate what happened so you can make changes for the next one.

Social Media Planning Made Easy!

Whether it’s Facebook, Instagram, or some other platform, most of your customers are likely on some type of social media. That means you need to be too, if you want to be able to reach them. The Social Media Insert is a great way for you to visualize your content plan across multiple channels and have an overall picture of your plan so that they’re all working together to help you get to your end goal. Plan a week at a time, or go ahead and plan out that whole month! Note: the layout is different between the Medium and XL so keep that in mind.

Be a Goal Getter!

Let’s chat about those goals! Putting your goals into words and making them visible is a key part of actually reaching those goals. The Goals & Finances Insert is a great way to see month over month how your business is performing. My sponsor sends out fun stickers when we meet certain criteria each month, and this is where I put them. Again, at a quick glance, I can see how I performed on any given month. Plus, there’s room in the back to track mileage and summarize info for taxes!

I am also a big fan of using the Goals & Habits Insert to track my social media habits (because there are definitely some parts of it that are less natural for me and I have to be intentional about doing them). I write my social media channels across the top of the page (e.g. FB Group, FB Page, IG, Stories, Team Group, Email, Blog, YouTube, Pinterest…). Not all of those are daily tasks, so some are included in the weekly habit tracking. This insert is easy to use to track whether (or not) you did a task though, so I can easily see whether I slacked off on my Instagram (yep) or was able to make that habit more consistent this month. Used in conjunction with my Goals and Finances Insert, it gives me another piece of information as to why one month might’ve been better than another.

Are you building a team?

I love the Team Building Insert for tracking my personally sponsored crew mates (we are the Chaos Crew). This insert makes it easy for me to see what their monthly sales have been, what rewards they have earned from me, what coaching calls they’ve had with me, what their goals are, etc. I know there are some who prefer to do this electronically, and when my team gets a bit bigger, I may have to go that route as well. However, I like the ease of having it in front of me whenever I need it instead of having to have my computer or having to run a report to see the information.

Back to Basics

Of course, you may also want to include a Monthly Insert and your favorite Weekly Layout as well to keep up with schedules. I personally have those in an entirely different planner, but you could absolutely put those here as well.

I also suggest having a to-do list insert and a well noted insert just to keep up with the basics! I use my Well Noted to keep up with information from corporate each month (e.g. new release info, sales info, etc.) as well as team incentives. The To-Do List is great for keeping a running list of what you need to get done!

So what do you really need in your direct sales planner?

I’m going to make it super easy for you and give you a bulleted list of my favorite inserts to put into your new direct sales planner. You can add or remove if there are things you don’t need yet. I do recommend not trying to implement too many things at one time. You can always add more inserts later. It is more important to get something that you will actually use!

With that many inserts, you’ll need to choose a Classic Cover (which will fit up to eight inserts). Make sure you add those FREE jump bands to your cart when you order 4+ inserts!

Develop your plan and then crush those goals.

As you saw in this guide, there are many parts of your direct sales business that can benefit from a little bit of planning.

Now you have everything you need to start building your personal direct sales planner. Before you get started creating your own planner, make sure you leave me a comment to tell me which part of your direct sales business you’re going to start planning next!