Javita marketing emphasises top member drawback
Back when I first looked at the Javita business opportunity, I identified one of major drawbacks potential distributors were going to face was in the amount of product required to be given out as samples.
When we decide if a coffee is good or not, do we necessarily care where or how it’s made? No.
What do we rely on? Taste.
Trying to sell someone coffee without them actually having tasted the product is a truly futile exercise. As a coffee drinker just ask yourself, ‘would I commit to buying coffee without actually having tried it first?’
Sure, you might take a gamble at the supermarket – but we all know that unless the coffee company is having a promotion, the supermarket itself isn’t going to let you taste test anything.
Meanwhile as an independent member of Javita trying to convince someone Javita coffee is the best tasting in the world, what’s the easiest way to go about this?
Offer them a taste test sample.
Naturally Javita themselves aren’t going to compensate you for this and due to the samples counting as product being sold from a company standpoint, they might even actively encourage it.
Now that we’re in the post launch stages of Javita and official marketing material is starting to trickle out, unfortunately this seems to be the case.
In a recent PDF titled ‘coffee sampling system’ put out by Javita’s training division ‘Javanomics’, Javita outline one possible marketing strategy distributors can try to sell Javita and the business opportunity attached.
The process begins by making a list of leads and grading them with either a ‘C’ (coffee drinker), a M (someone interested in making money) or both.
From this list distributors are then encouraged to contact anyone who qualifies as both a C and M. A script is provided and goes something like this;
“Hi Bob. I just have a minute, but I wanted to ask you quickly, who do you know that drinks coffee?” (if they say “I do” or “me”)
“Why do you drink it?” (Listen, they are going to give you their reason for wanting to try our coffee)
“I just started a new coffee company. Here is a cup of estate grown, 100% natural instant gourmet coffee I would like to share with you that will (give them their reason back “give you a better pick-meup”…“lets you function faster and better”).
“Do me a favor, taste it and I would like to call you tomorrow and get your feedback on it. What time is good to call you?”
The marketing info has a few other examples on how to contact your leads but ultimately (if they drink coffee or knows someone who does) you’re encouraged to send them a sample.
With a limited supply of coffee to send out as a sample, obviously distributors are sooner or later going to run out and have to reorder product again from Javita.
Now statistically, it’s inevitable that some distributors aren’t going to make a sale – and this perfectly illustrates the biggest challenge you as a distributor of Javita coffee are going to face. That is, balancing your sample expenditure with the money coming in.
Naturally when you start with Javita, unless you get extremely lucky, your net income is probably is going to be in the negative as the sample product cost will drain you while you try to find customers/leads to recruit.
A successful Javita distributor will eventually find customers or recruit their generated leads but not everyone is going to have this success and this is where you need to carefully measure you’re initial outlay.
I’d advise drawing up a budget and setting an absolute maximum cap. This is the amount of money you’re going to pump into samples before calling it a day. Spend what you can afford and don’t over extend yourself.
Naturally Javita themselves and you’re upline are most likely going to encourage you to keep buying samples on autoship but at the end of the day if so many months go by and you’re not having any luck, it might be time to evaluate how you’re going in the business and explore the possibility that it’s just not a good fit for you.
Finally, I’d also advise that you steer clear of those, like Polaris Global’s Rachel Oliver, who tell you that you just haven’t been running the business long enough. As an upline or representative of the company itself, these people naturally have a vested interest in your continued expenditure into Javita. Needless to say their advice is certainly not without bias and/or possible financial ulterior motives.
Remember, despite what you might be encouraged to do or not do, be responsible and always put your own finances before that of either your upline or the business opportunity you’re working with.
Good luck!
This marketing plan sounds reasonable at first, but again ignores the problem: how does the PRODUCT sell against comparable products?
I thought we have established that Javita coffee costs TWICE as much as equivalent product from Starbucks. So how *do* you convince people who already drink coffee (and probably even LESS premium than Starbuck’s VIA single-serving stuff) to switch to Javita, pay through the nose, AND somehow convince more suckers… I mean potential customers to try it?
What is the selling point, other than “you can sell it and make money”? That’s a circular argument. You can sell it because you can sell it. 😛
Well, like the Javita official marketing spiel says, the selling point is whatever reason the customer tells you they enjoy drinking coffee for.
It appears Javita doesn’t have any coffee related unique properties off its own.
Come to think of it, doesn’t most “lousy” MLMs present arguments that way? You can sell it because… you can sell it? Or put it another way, you should sell it because it is an income opportunity. Why is it an income opportunity? Because you can sell it! It’s a huge circlejerk.
Real MLMs have real products that people are willing to buy, and are unique enough on the market to warrant its own niche. You may have to mix it with something else (like Javafit claim to be coffee with ‘fitness’, or Xango with Mangosteen mix) but it must NOT compete directly against stuff already on the market (having NO reputation to fall behind, nor likely to beat stuff on price, direct competition means losing proposition).
Javita, in this case, seem to fail this crucial test. (IMHO, of course)
wow. lot of mis-information here. First, Javita instant is not 2x the cost of Starbucks – more expensive, yes, but IF YOU TRY IT you’ll probably like it more than Via.
Honestly, it’s really, really good coffee.
Second, it’s not juiced up with any mushrooms, but it is blended with 4 herbs that help you with alertness, etc.
So, it’s a premium coffee that can stand on it’s own and (as they say) gives you more of what you’re looking for in a good cup of coffee.
@Jon
Your mention of mushrooms seems to be the only instance it appears on this page?
And a ‘good cup of coffee’ is subjective. You can’t honestly suggest Javita is going to taste good to every person on the planet.
It might be worth updating this article to reflect Javita now has a weight loss coffee (which works) and which offers a much stronger retail option for distributors.
From our own experience, my husband and I have been able to retail between 5 – 10 boxes of Javita weight loss coffee each month.
No sampling, no friends and family – just people looking to lose a little weight and too lazy (oops) too busy to exercise 😉
We also teach our team how to do this – so new distributors are not out of pocket following the post and sample plan mentioned above (which I agree stinks!)
Anyway – hope you’re happy to include my comment – MLM isn’t for everyone and your site makes it clear that new people should do their due diligence before spending hundreds of dollars joining a company based on some new fad/hype.
Ros
Hey Ros, glad to hear some retailing is going on in Javita. I haven’t looked at them for a while but I do remember an increasing trend towards recruitment incentives happening with their comp plan over time.
All the best.
Took them a year and a half to come up with a schtick: weight-loss coffee?