Welcome to FrankKeefer.com!

When I walked away from the corporate world some twenty years ago I was a vice-president of domestic operations for an international corporation earning an exceptionally strong six-figure income. I was in my mid forties and by all accounts successful. Success then, as today, was measured by position, title and income. I had achieved all of those things and they no longer mattered to me. The kids were grown and gone, I was married to the most wonderful girl in the world and she was sitting home alone while I was on the road 24/7. What kind of husband was I?

My corporate responsibilities controlled my life. The sands were whistling through the hourglass. There had to be a better way

I decided to go into business for myself. Over the course of my life I had owned or been a principle in several businesses concurrent with my corporate career. I no longer wanted the aggravation of employees, overhead, etc so I made the decision to open a one-man shop and operate out of my home – an unusual concept at the time for a person who had attained my level of success since commercial office space was considered an indicator of credibility.

In spite of my previous corporate income, I had no cash reserves. I had purchased an expensive piece of property on the Chesapeake Bay based on the conclusion of a sale with a previous company that earned me several million dollars. When that company – a Fortune Fifty corporation – reneged on paying me I was stuck with an outrageous debt service that consumed my life’s savings and very nearly forced me into bankruptcy.

My decision to strike out on my own – doing what I didn’t know – and with no cash behind me, was either gutsy or stupid. All I knew was that I wanted to be with my wife and I couldn’t do that imprisoned in corporate America.

I was introduced to a concept called network marketing. I was intrigued by the prominence of leverage which was an integral part of my success in the corporate America. In spite of the fact that at the time the industry was dominated by part-time stay at home moms, I saw parallels to my background in traditional business. It was about developing sales teams and moving product. I had done that early on in my corporate career as a local manager responsible for building a sales team within a given city. Then, later, as a Regional Manager, I was responsible for building sales teams within several states and, as I climbed the corporate ladder, eventually across the country. I viewed this new opportunity as no different, with the exception that each member of the team was an independent contractor, which made the administration of my job infinitely easier than it had been in the corporate world. I hopped on board.

Generic information on network marketing at the time was scant. To get my sales organization on the road to success, I wrote Let’s Get Down to Business. The book was based on management and leadership principles that I’d learned in over twenty-five collective years in the military and corporate America and on my life experiences to that point. Since then, volumes of material have become available. Much of it today reflects those approaches that I initiated nearly two decades ago.

I’ve been with four network marketing organizations since that time, three early on and the last for fourteen years. Using the principles from my original book, presented here in anecdotal form, starting from scratch with each successive company, I have successfully hit the top pin level in the last three companies.

My bona fides has been established not only by my own success but by the success of countless folks within my organizations. The number of super stars that I have played some role in developing is all out of proportion with the random probability of finding a few diamonds in the rough.

Even after a ten year hiatus due to my health, the solidity of the organization that I built in thirty-seven months, fourteen years ago, using the principles presented in this Trilogy, still places me in the upper 1/10 of 1% of income earners. More importantly, during the three years that I was actively building, I satisfied my goal of creating more million-dollar earners per capita in a shorter period of time than anyone in the history of the industry. I developed my organization to be symmetrically balanced with high earners in each sales team. When I was active, my attrition was almost non-existent. My organizations have moved hundreds of millions of dollars in product. While the power of the plan is certainly significant to my success, my approach has undoubtedly played a major role.

How was I able to accomplish this? Simply by overlaying my past life’s experiences and the lessons learned from those experiences on top of the networking model. From these lessons I was educated as to how to locate diamond fields of pre-cut gems and become the De Beers cartel of successful home-based business entrepreneurs. In this book and the prequel and sequel, I make those secrets available for your consideration.

After the success of my first book, Let’s Get down to Business, I was bombarded with requests to write a second book. I took a rain check for a decade. I was too busy having fun building my business. My focus was on being a successful network marketer, not a retailer of training aids. I’ve always written for my own enjoyment and to pass along my life’s experiences and lessons to my children and grandchildren. Ultimately however, I did write a second book, Reflections of a Master. The book was a hit and I was again bombarded to write a follow up. I had more than enough material already written to publish a sequel and even though I felt an obligation to give back to a profession that has generously rewarded me, I held off simply because I didn’t want to be in the training aids business. Secondly, although there are many fine coaches and trainers in our profession who have a lot to offer, I learned during my stint in the publishing industry that there is also a plethora of self-anointed gurus, with no substantial frame of reference, who situate themselves to cash in on the ever increasing popularity of the home-based industry business with the intent to line their pockets through the promotion of their books and tapes. I didn’t want to be lumped into that category.

Additionally, I had no need for ego gratification. My accomplishments speak for themselves. Ultimately however I rationalized that if I donated the net proceeds to charity, my value structure would remain intact and not be compromised. So, I compiled my archived anecdotes, some of them decades old, into a third book, Continuing the Journey with nearly enough material left over for a fourth book, the third and concluding volume of the trilogy. That edition, The Adventure Continues, should be available before the end of 2007.

This trilogy is not about techniques. “How to’s” are a dime a dozen. Technique will carry you only so far. Without a fundament understanding of cause and effect, you will never fully maximize your potential. It’s amazing how many “experts” fail to comprehend this fundamental principle. Furthermore, the material is not intended to convince you of anything, only to get your intellectual juices flowing.

The series is a study of cause and effect. It is a presentation of information. Interpret that information anyway you wish. Whether you agree with my conclusions or not, is irrelevant. The intent is to recognize that every action produces a predictable result.

The stories are true. Exaggeration would undermine their validity. Those who know me can attest that I have no need to embellish. In some anecdotes, the names may have been changed and some minor editorial license may have been exercised. A few of these anecdotes have appeared in other publications but their message is worth repeating. The vast majority of these anecdotes were written well before 9/11. As previously stated, some are 10-15 years old but their messages still ring true.

Lest anyone reading these anecdotes misinterpret my purpose or who I am, I can assure you that I’m no superman. I’m just a regular guy who suffers from the same fears, anxieties and insecurities as everyone else. Perhaps the secret that I’ve learned in life is that you are only playing against yourself. Your mind can be your greatest ally or your worst enemy. You need to work, as I do on a daily basis, to cultivate that alliance.

In this series you will embark on a lifetime of adventures that have revealed to me many of the secrets to success and happiness. Our journey will be an emotional roller coaster. Together, we will experience exhilarating joy and devastating heartache, terrifying fear and overwhelming confidence. We will discover the magnificent human spirit and optimism for the future as we travel from the asphalt jungle to the blackboard jungle; from the jungles of Southeast Asia, to the jungles of Central America and South Africa; from the frozen tundra of the Arctic North to the deep blue oceans of the South Pacific; from Tiananmen Square to the war ravaged lands of Vietnam, El Salvador, Yugoslavia (Bosnia) and Zimbabwe; from the classroom to the emergency room, from the operating room to the boardroom; from skydiving to scuba diving; from start-up businesses to Fortune Fifty companies; from entry-level sales to Corporate C.E.O; from marriage to divorce to marriage again, from being a kid to raising kids, from the first business opportunity meeting to speaking before tens of thousands. It’s a journey of growth. If you open your mind, you will be changed forever.

 

Fore more information email fjk@frankkeefer.com.