Telecommunications Business Opportunity, you must read this!!!

by D GRIGGS on 2007-02-05 20:35:51

Telecommunications Business Opportunity, you must read this!!!

When a company has to rewrite its business plan, things usually haven't been
going too well. That's not so for Rochester, N.Y.-based 5LINXT, a
telecommunications company that sells its products and services through a
network of dedicated independent business representatives. Just the opposite
is true. Explosive growth in business operations, particularly its GLOBALINX
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) subsidiary, forced company executives to
revise their targets significantly upward. "In March, after our Spring
National, things just went ballistic," says President and CEO Craig
Jerabeck. "We're going to finish 2006 about 50 percent ahead of plan. Then
in 2007, we're going to be almost 220 percent of our plan. We just had to
rewrite the plan!"

5LINX started as a direct seller of wireless and long distance services in
March 2001 when Jerabeck, whose extensive background in telecommunications
included franchising wireless retail stores, teamed with Jeb Tyler and Jason
Guck, now V.P. Sales & Marketing and V.P. Operations, respectively. Both
Co-Founders Tyler and Guck were experienced in direct selling and Tyler
introduced Jerabeck to the power of network marketing. "I'd never even heard
of direct selling before 1997 or so," Jerabeck says. "5LINX started because
Jeb was with another network marketing company and was trying to sell me
services from his other company. As I got to know Jeb, I started to
understand the power of the direct selling model, and I thought this was a
great way to get an army of representatives who would be paid the way I was,
which was basically paid on performance."

5LINX' primary product now is VoIP, a high-growth sector of the $400
billion-plus telecommunications industry. VoIP allows individuals and
businesses to make voice calls using a broadband Internet connection instead
of a regular phone line. According to respected independent technology
research and consulting firm Yankee Group, VoIP has 5.5 million users in the
United States, and that number is expected to grow to more than 20 million
by the end of 2008. Worldwide usage of VoIP is also increasing dramatically.
Seeing the trend, 5LINX invested about $2 million this past year to purchase
the switching capability to become a VoIP carrier, establishing its presence
in the marketplace and giving it flexibility in the products, plans and
services it markets.

Moving from being a marketer of telecommunications services to an actual
carrier has propelled 5LINX into the desired state of all young network
marketing companies: momentum. "When we became our own VoIP carrier, we
believe that started the ball rolling and our growing to be the company that
we want to be," Jeb Tyler says. "It gives confidence in the distributors'
minds that this isn't just an agent company or a network marketing company,
but a telecommunications provider as well, and this has opened up more
margins, which equals more commissions for the distributors."

5LINX' growth has caught the attention of the broader business community. In
2006, 5LINX came in at number 338 on Inc. magazine's Inc. 500, a list of the
nation's fastest-growing private companies. Jerabeck says being on the Inc.
500 list had more impact on the company than he anticipated. "All of a
sudden, people feel comfortable with us as a business-we aren't going to be
here today, gone tomorrow," he says. "Even though we've been here for
five-almost six-years, I think people are somewhat skeptical of our
industry. The distributors feel great about it because they already are
believers, and now other people know that this is a credible organization
they are working with."


Tyler adds: "Being listed among the 500 fastest-growing companies in the
market has eliminated questions in our distributors' and our prospective
customers' minds about the stability and long-term viability of the company.
It has added a whole new level of success to our company. We plan on being
among the top 500 for the next five years-that's the growth curve that we're
on." In addition, 5LINX also made the 2006 Rochester 100 list of
fastest-growing companies in that area.

5LINX' executives believe the company will continue to grow rapidly, because
they have connected the right products at the right time with the right
distribution model. "Eighty percent of the population today does not
understand what VoIP is, or is unaware of it," Guck says. "If you're 25 or
younger, then you probably understand VoIP. But 50 and up, you're not likely
to pick up the phone and say 'Yeah, I want that VoIP' because you probably
don't know what it is. We feel network marketing is a much better strategy
for telling people what VoIP is-now your friend or distributor can come over
and hook it up for you and you've got a dial tone. You start saving money
and then you're telling people about it. It's working the way network
marketing was designed to work-through word-of-mouth."

Direct selling and VoIP are a great fit because person-to-person
demonstration and selling are joined with an emerging technology. Offer
people a great business opportunity, and therein lies the formula for
explosive growth. "I think our product, especially, is the right product at
the right time, but the distribution model works," Jerabeck says. "I was in
franchising for a long time before this, and I was franchising wireless
stores-we had a great brand and great products. What's unique in my mind
about this business is that it allows everyone to become a business owner
and franchisee, but it costs next to nothing in terms of cost of entry. It's
a way to test the waters of free enterprise and entrepreneurialism and not
get hurt. If you like it, it can be a springboard to building a really big
business."

Jerabeck, Tyler and Guck have positioned 5LINX distributors to capitalize on
another emerging technology that complements VoIP service: the video phone.
5LINX has a direct selling industry exclusive with a manufacturer of video
phones. Priced at $199, the GLOBALINX VideoPhone allows users with a
broadband connection to hear and see each other anywhere in the world with
no per-minute toll charges. "What's exciting," Guck says, "is that 99
percent of the population doesn't have any idea that they can make an
affordable video phone call from their home." 5LINX is spreading the word
about affordable video telephony.

Demand for the VideoPhone among ethnic communities in the United States is
exploding and pushing 5LINX' expansion internationally. Immigrants,
particularly from Africa and South and Central America, are purchasing the
GLOBALINX VideoPhones and shipping them to family members in their countries
of origin. According to Jerabeck, the VideoPhone is a great tool for
first-generation immigrants who need an inexpensive way not only to talk to
friends and relatives, but to see them. "Now people who haven't seen each
other in many, many years can actually see each other for very low cost by
using our VideoPhone," he says.

During their company's rapid growth, the co-founders have looked to the
Direct Selling Association for guidance and information and have found the
organization a tremendous resource. "We have found great value in the DSA,
because we have actually networked with a lot of the top owners in the
industry," Tyler says. "They have given us a lot of good advice on growth,
expansion, some of the pitfalls that they went through and how to avoid
making the same mistakes they did. The best way to learn how to become a
$100 million- or a billion-dollar company-our ultimate goal for 5LINX is to
become a billion-dollar VoIP provider-is to learn from companies who have
done it already. We've really listened and found a lot of value in that."

5LINX is a rapidly growing telecommunications company that provides products
and services across the United States and in 20 countries. With 15 million
people in the United States and an even larger number worldwide expected to
become VoIP users in the next two years, Tyler believes they have just begun
to scratch the surface. "The exciting thing is that VoIP is really the
future of telecommunications," he says. "We're at the front end of this
curve, and we expect some major growth over the next three to five years,
capturing market share in the VoIP arena. That's our game plan, and helping
as many people as we can change their opportunities in life along the way.
We want to impact tens of thousands of people with this opportunity. People
will save money with the products and also make money with 5LINX."

For more info click on link... http://5linx.net/jax/makeMoney.asp