Many IBOs are taught to "buy from themselves". Although in some of these groups, retailing may be mentioned, it certainly is not taught in a serious manner. I believe it is because people in general simply are not comfortable with selling products. Thus the concept of buy from yourself makes the masses comfortable. What they do not realize is that they are simply loyal Amway customers and not running a business. As I mentioned in a previous post, in what business do you not have customers? It is why IBOs must ask themselves, are they running a "real" business?
For many IBOs, the focus of their efforts is on recruiting others. But why would someone want to join a system where they basically sign up to be a loyal customer and be a recruiter for other loyal customers? The pyramid like compensation plan is what drives many IBOs. Find enough downline and eventually, your downline will absorb the financial losses for you and will become the srouce of your income. I believe that the 4000 PV or platinum level is about where you as an IBO can find teh break even point if you are dedicated to the "system" consisting of tapes, cds, books, voicemail and functions.
Secondarily, in addition to signing on as a loyal customer of Amway, if you join a system and participate in standing order and/or functions, then you have also become a loyal customer of the "system". Sadly, many upline will push IBOs to keep purchasing tools regardless of the IBO's progress in the business.
So I ask the question again for IBOs and potential recruits. As an IBO, are you running a real business? Can you get a business loan using the 6-4-2 plan? Have you tried showing it to a loan officer? Can you cite BWW or WWDB as educational credentials when applying for a job or will you be laughed out of the room? For these very reasons, I can only conclude that many, possibly most IBOs are not running a "real" business. They are simply doing what their upline advises. These uplines are more concerned about selling their tools than they are about their downline IBOs. It appears that downline IBOs are expendable. They quickly become bitter, broke, or not having expended enough effort if they do not "make it".
So are you running a real business?
20 comments:
Amway is a real business if you treat it as a real business. Stop bashing Amway you loser.
Yeah, real business owners go around calling people losers. Right. Who don't you go diamond? That might prove something.
The more I learn about it, the more I see that Amway IBO's are really just retailers...Like people who work in a store who sell the merchandise. Except when you go into a clothing store, there are the salespeople right there, being paid for the hours they put in.
Those people don't go around telling everyone they own their own business or hide/lie about the actual name of the company they work for. They also don't have to pay for the privilege of being an employee at that company, ie, the initial start up kit that Amway IBOs have to buy.
Average IBOs, instead of getting a steady paycheck for the hours they put in recruiting, attending meetings, etc., have to instead take their meager earnings and buy other unrelated crap to ostensibly help them retail better. And con other people into buying/retailing the same crap. And then go around calling honest working people 'broke losers'.
Amway: Preying on the weak minded for 50 years!
Awesome.
Who don't you go diamond? Who don't I? I don't understand the meaning of that. I know I am because I do the walk.
Anonymous, you confuse employee with business ownership mentality. You sound like an employee.
Anonymous from Canada, you must have employee mentality because you have a job. LOL
What have you accomplished in Amway? 100 PV?
What exactly is wrong with being an employee? Not much from my standpoint. I get a steady income from the hours that I work, health benefits, a savings plan and I don't have to lie about what I do or the company I work for. I earn enough money to pay for my mortgage and live a decent life. And I am very grateful to to have a J-O-B I love.
Amway IBOs would be better off joining Costco - one low initial joining fee and lots of savings right off the bat without having to con anyone else into a pyramid 'compensation' (what a joke anyway) plan or having to sell any products. Further, many IBOs would be better served by obtaining a second part time job for a little extra $$. You can keep your crappy $115/mo that you have to reinvest in tools/standing order.
IBOs sell Amway products. This makes them retailers not business owners. Amway is the business and you are an employee, one that isn't very well compensated for the time and effort you expend in your endeavors.
"Employee Mentality" again?????
If one of the pro-IBOs could come with some clever new sayings, their Diamond would pay them handsomely for it!
Of course - that would require a "business" mentality!
Let's come up with some "mentalities" for IBOs!!
"Sucker" mentality
"Cult" mentality
"Sheep" mentality
"Stalk people at the mall" mentality
"Brag about tax return after posting another loss on my Schedule C for the year" mentality
It's fun!
Anonymous (Joecool) from Hawaii, I assure you that if I only had employee mentality, I would not be involved in having a business, ok? Just so to clear ihat up. You seem awfully confused but my best best bet is that you act that way on purpose. You're not an idiot by nature but by choice.
I find it funny that you ask me if all I have accomplished is 100 PV as if I couldn't go past that. You went 4000 PV didn't you? So you imply that only Joecool made it to 4000 somehow but in practice no one can go past 100 so Joecool must somehow be special, an enlightened being, a messenger from God who is preaching the truth. I'll reinforce the truth, you quit. That's the truth, ok?
Anonymous, it wasn't ok for you it seems to stop at 5:28 PM on September 1st, you had to come down with more verbal diarrhea the morning of the next day: I get steady income from my job, health benefits, savings plan, retirement plan, decent living, I AM SAFE FOR LIFE, etc until one Monday morning your world is truned upside down. So what will you do then? Restart the rat race? That may be the option for you, not for me. Why be part of that when I can dictate my own life independent of a boss? 115 dollats per month? Is that the max? It seems that you believe it is just like Joecool does. Oh you see, Amway said so by itself! That's an average only for the personal business circle, not the personal business team! There's no average for the personal business team because each team scenario is different so you can't come up with an average. But you can if you refer to the personal business circle.
Cult mentality, stalker mentality, sheep mentality... that applies more readily in the corporate world that in having your own business where you're your own boss but see, neither you nor Joecool and the rest of the flock can understand that because you got only employee mentality and as soon as an employee opens his eyes his fellow employee betrays him by stabbing him in the back and/or reporting him to the boss. It happened to me more that once but the diference is that I'm indifferent to who thinks what so that's why I push on with building my business. You quit so your only option it seems is to go back and kiss your boss on Monday morning; I won't shed a tear.
Anonymous from Canada, why don't you enlighten us so we know what level you have achieved with your Amway business? The truth is I quit? Yes, but what is important is why I quit. At 4000 PV I was not making any money and I didn't see going platinum as making much of a difference. You see, I had a business mentality. That's why I quit! A business mentality can recoginze when a busibess is not worth the effort and getting out to try something else.
You talk about waking up one Monday and getting screwed. Well, what about TEAM? What if you wake up one Monday and your donwline find out something negative about your past? Your business is history as well.
Who says I go to work and kiss up to my boss on Mondays? Has it occured to you that maybe Joecool is the boss at work?
Why don't you tell us what you have accomplished in Amway so we can all marvel at your achievements? *crickets chirping*
OK Anon from Canada - before you have a stroke, here's a little lesson for you:
REAL business owners don't care if someone works a J-O-B or not, they work to attract that potential customer to generate revenue and then profit. You know - that "accounting" thingy.
Go to a bank and ask for a business loan, then say you have no capital,no plan, but you have "business mentality". When they pick themselves off the floor from laughter, maybe the idea will sink in.
Got P/L??? Got DD-214??
Real business owners with a business mentality focus on their bottom line. They look at whether the made a profit or not. If not, they look at cutting expenses or selling more goods. IBOs conversely, think that the solution to a struggling Amway business is to by more standing order or function tickets, and then trying to expand their business by sponsoring others, if they can find anyone to sponsor.
Real business owners with a business mentality, do not spend their time debating the merits of their business on blogs.
Sorry guys you haven't been of much help to me. I'll listen to someone else who can help me. One thing that you're right about Joecool is that real business owners do not debate the merits of their business on blogs. That part is true. Not getting advice from blogs is the second part. That being said, I'm not here to debate. Your type of person is less than desirable. Good luck and farewell!
Well, anonymous from Canada, why not prove your succes in Amway and talk about your net profit versus losses? I bet you have a net loss.
well i know all the pros and cons but my daughter is an ibo and i can't complain she keeps herself a float and i myself love the products i have lupus and al whole bunch of things and i have been useing the double x and belive me when i say i feel great docs said i would not be around to long if i dont take care of myself right i use alot of stuff in the market an i could put my head on a chopping block an say i really do thank the fact that i found double x love it hey if you wanna look at her site here you go www.amway.com/natassialrolon i know someone also that can tell you that he is doing great and he went from having a 149 t cell count to 1312 t cell count using double x and other supplerments on the page 22yrs he has been sick and still going strong god bless you all
that's good. now they just need to mark down the prices. big-time.
im a customer and i dont mind paying retail because everything is top of the lina thanks amway
I've just found this site, and I'd like to add my views on the matter, even though it has been over three years since the last posted comment.
Amway-Quixtar (or whatever new name they think up for themselves as a disguise) is indeed a fraud, as the governments of both the United Kingdom and India discovered quite some time ago. But frauds are common, since millions of ordinary human beings are weak and stupid, and easily fall for frauds. Con-men like the Amway-Quixtar rip-off artists merely take advantage of this fact. There's nothing unusual in that.
But when I read the indignant replies of the Amway-Quixtar defenders here and at other sites where the fraudulent business is exposed or questioned, I realize something else. Amway-Quixtar is a RELIGION! The poor schnooks involved in it are utterly unmoved by simple facts or evidence, because they are passionate religious members of the Amway Church. You can't talk to them in a rational manner. They are like Jehovah's Witnesses or Scientologists. When you attack Amway, they get infuriated with the same rage that an religious fanatic experiences when his beliefs are questioned or ridiculed.
So ask yourself this -- how can a business be a religion? Well, it can't. A true business is based on the rational understanding of means and ends, and a clear-sighted perception of profit, loss, and market realities. Amway-Quixtar is concerned with none of these things. It is primarily concerned with hype, enthusiasm, dreams, absurd optimism, and the pressing need to get other silly people to join the religion and be hyped up too. As for the enforced buying of all the useless "tools" and "tapes," this is just Amway-Quixtar's equivalent of the collection plate at a religious meeting. You don't contribute your money to be successful in the business. You contribute it because you are making a sacrifice to your church: the Holy Church of Amway-Quixtar, run by your blessed up-line (the hierarchy) and governed by the Holy Popes Van Andel and De Vos.
Great comments. And yes, Amway meetings at times have been compared to revival meetings and at times, cult like. The IBOs get fired up in the (false) belief that they are helping people, making a better life for themselves and achieving the dream of financial freedom.
Sadly, what IBOs crave the most (time and money) is what they end up with less of because of their involvement in Amway. It this reason why I created this blog and continue to update it,. Because I hope to provide life changing information for people who are seeking it.
Joecool, thanks for your site and blog. I am a real (non-MLM) business owner, and I have the utmost respect for employees. Recently someone I had worked with before I started my business conned me into breakfast to "catch up". It turned out to be..you know what. The guy had the same "poor slog" attitude towards employees, (even nurses and teachers) even though, as I've discovered, after 8 years he still has a full time job. A bit ironic. I (business owner) respect employees, he (employee and quasi Amway business owner) looks down on them, even though he is still one, thinking his escape is just around the corner.I 've found your site to look for information so I can at least talk on his level to try to get him to leave this crap that is consuming him. Anyway, I like your comparisons with a real business, and find the example about the loan officer quite telling, even funny if it was not so sad. Some more differences: most real businesses can be sold, wholly or in part, by the owner, whenever he/she wants, to whomever he or she wants. Business are proud of the supplier whose products they stock. Think, the restaurant owner about the estates on the winelist, the car dealer about the car brands, and, in my case, as a consultancy regarding the software our business implements. Those are the first things we share in a pitch. Amway agents try to hide it as long as they can, because of the negative connectation of the name. Real businesses try to cast the definition of business expense as wide as possible, to offset against income. Amway IBO's seem to make it as narrow as possible, to convince themselves that they are profitable. In fact, when I asses the profitability of my business, as all real businesses do, even owner's salary is an expense. Real businesses take pride in telling people at social gatherings exactly what they do. Amway IBO's usually are quite vague with people the don't know yet (business opportunity coach or something like that, because Amway is a bit embarrassing). Real businesses choose and perhaps mix their suppliers (unless it's a franchise, in which case the franchisee is quite picky as to who they allow, and the market gap, to ensure it's not crowded). Amway IBO's are tied to a supplier, and anyone who wants to be an IBO is allowed. A real business signs contracts in the name of the business. Successful business can take on a life of it's own, which can make for a real nest egg, that can be sold for a lump sum. Not all business reach that, but it seems the odds are much better. Amway "businesses" are called IBO's. Note the "O"-Owner in that. They have no hope of ever taking on a life of it's own. Real business, especially small business, eat, dream and sleep the product offering at hand, and it's value to the final (external) customer. That is why businesses often spring up around an individuals talents an interests. From what I gather, product (the soaps, water purifiers etc) and external customer experience are very much by the way. It is clear that the real product is new hopefulls, and their tools. Keep up the good work, if you can get only a few individuals to rethink, this would be worth it. I think it is also clear that many of your experiences are mirrored (in the sense of different individuals, same ultimate experience) elsewhere on the net. I hope that honest IBO's doing true introspection will see that.
Thank you for your nice comments and I hope you found enough information to help you in talking to your friend. It is sad but somewhat humorous when you know what's going on and can predict what IBOs are going to do. Good luck to you!
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