The Home Business Success Academy (HBSA) is an Iowa based corporation that helps struggling network marketers leverage technology, positioning, and target marketing to grow their business. While having developed a reputation as an outstanding company, not everyone approves of their methods of training. Let’s take an unbiased look at HBSA and see what their methods are all about.
History:
HBSA is the brainchild of Martin Lightbowne and Joshua Fusion, two independent and very successful network marketers. As a collaborative effort, Josh and Martin put together a “home study” type course for teaching network marketing on a global scale, as Josh resides in the US and Martin in the UK.
HBSA is accredited with the Better Business Bureau and has been awarded an A- rating. The BBB notes, on their web site, as the reason for (a non A) rating as “Length of time business has been operating.” I would expect this to be upgraded after reach the BBB standard.
The Course:
HBSA markets 2 training courses, the Basic and the Elite. The Basic course centers around positioning the student on the web with their own web page, understanding targeted traffic, and driving targeted traffic to that page via the Social Media, Web 2.0, and writing articles, just to mention a few. The goal of the student in the Basic course is to create 5-15 leads a day and start adding 1 to 3 people a week into their business.
The Elite course comes after the student has finished the basics. Now the student makes the jump to “warp speed” to start really moving the business along. This includes understanding and using paid advertising, sales letters, newsletters, funded proposals, advanced prospecting and closing methods and especially team building. The goal of the students in the Elite course is to generate 100+ leads a day, and start adding 10-15 people a week into their business.
HBSA – The Good:
HBSA has moved completely away from the “Friends and Family” approach of years ago, and center around knowing your product, your prospect, and leveraging technology to help you succeed. Your syllabus consists of workbooks and DVD’s, your classroom is your office, and your class schedule is when you can allocate that time to your business. There are also on-line sessions, as well as role play and Q/A sessions utilizing a telephone conference room.
The marketing principles being taught here center on the student knowing their target market and how to “reach out” to that market. Those skills involve the use of the telephone, the written word, and especially the internet. These are all stable elements used by most top level marketers.
HBSA utilizes leading edge technology to “walk” the student through setting up their personal web page, and driving traffic to that page. Their emphasis is not only on the mechanics, but also on the psychology of network marketing. After the student is comfortable, they again walk the student (in the Elite program) through more advanced techniques of internet advertising and autoresponders. If you can write an email, you can master this technology.
One of the most unique features of HBSA course, is that they offer a performance guarantee to all their students. With the Elite course, the student is given a target goal of add 700 people into the business in a year’s time. If they do not reach that goal, they will continue on as a student until they do. (The Basic course has the same performance guarantee, but only a level of 100 people)
It seems HBSA can stand by this guarantee, because they provide each student with their own, professional, marketing mentor to help them every step of the way. Almost every gold medal Olympic athlete has had their own personal trainer, and HBSA subscribes to that same winning philosophy.
HBSA – The Bad:
HBSA expects that each student will commit to spending an average of 5-10 hours a week working their business to get these results. HBSA goes so far as to require this commitment with an electronic signature on the guarantee document. For those people who are not ready make this commitment, and to “put it on the line”, they don’t get “in the door.”
This course is very detailed, with workbooks, DVD’s, on-line sessions and a personal mentor for (at least) 1 year. For those that expect a “cheep fix” for their marketing problems, then perhaps they should invest in a $19.95 eBook somewhere out on the internet.
Also, while HBSA notes that have students in over 30 countries, the course is only in English. For someone outside the English speaking world, this would not be attractive.
If you have read any of the articles published by Josh or Martin, you know these gentlemen are very “matter of fact” and “straight to the point” when it comes to network marketing, and I expect their training is the same. If you are shy, or offended by someone whose methods could be “in your face” when it’s needed, then perhaps this course is too strong for you.
In Conclusion:
This course could almost be called a “no brainier” for those who take their marking business very seriously. The course structure, the leveraging of technology and especially the support they provide speak for itself. HBSA certainly is concerned with the success of each and every student they work with.
