One of the things IBOs "think" they posssess, but in reality they are far from it, is "Business Mentality". It is not necessarily the fault of the IBOs. Many are sponsored into Amway by trusted friends and lacking business experience, they will "submit" to upline as they are advised and will try to learn about the Amway business. The problem is that many upline leaders teach self serving business practices such as hard core dedication to their tools system, from which they often handsomely profit. Let's examine some of the questionable practices.
"Buy from yourself". If you have a business owner mentality, you only buy from yourself if it's beneficial to your business. Many IBOs talk about ridiculous things like a McDonald's owner would never eat at Burger King. That's bull crap. Just because I own a McDonald's doesn't mean I am eating Big Macs the rest of my life. You cannot spend yourself to prosperity. If I sold pens for $1.00 and my cost was .50, and my competitor had a special on the same pens at 3 for $1.00, I'm buying them from my competition. Also, buying from yourself makes you a customer, not a business owner.
"Ignore facts if you have a dream". This is probably the biggest heap of bull crap taught by some upline. I have seen this spouted in particular by IBOs downline from WWDB and BWW leaders. A business owner studies the facts, not ignores them. Any REAL business owner wants to know how much he is bringing in and how much is going out. That's how you detect the heartbeat of your business. A site visitor named Gina on this site, recently posted a profit/loss statement from her real business. Naturally, IBOs were at a loss to discuss it because it was foreign material to them.
"Submit to upline" Another load of hogwash. Why should someone submit to upline simply because they "sponsored me" or whatever? A real business owner would think independently and make business decisions based on facts and numbers, not on the advice of someone upline who hasn't taken the time to assess each IBO on a personal level to be able to give advice on an IBO's "Indepdendent Business", or worse, advice on their personal lives".
"Dedication to the system". Silly advice as well. What dedication does the system have for an IBO? If an IBO succeeds (which is very rare), the system takes credit, but for the more than 99% of people who never make a significant income, it is their own fault if they don't make it. Amway apologists will defend this by saying that many may not have signed up wanting a significant income. While that may be partially true, tell me where people show "plans" designed for the guy who wants an extra $100 a month? The plans shown are always (AFAIK) to go platinum or diamond.
IBOs and information seekers, does any of this sound familiar? Is this a part of your experience? If so, I encourage you to ask questions here and get more information before proceeding with any more "business" activity.
14 comments:
Amway IBO leadership knows that less than 1% of the field will actually build the business. This 1/2% is generally accompanied by a "wingman" in the downline who heavily assists but isn't quite as hard working as the former mentioned.
Armed with this information, the key to success becomes slowing the attrition rate of the 99% while getting them to :
A - Do volume
B - "Invest" in the system
C - Both A & B
Every "Business Owner Mentality" concept that is taught is a means to this end. Make it easy to start, hard to leave, and desirable to do A, B, & C.
The very first step towards being controlled is allowing oneself to be convinced that someone else (upline) is all knowing (or at least knows more than you) and always has your best interest at heart. Once that "mentorship" (not really mentorship but promoted as such) mentality is accepted as Gospel, the IBO is in for a long, hard ride - and the more determined and ambitious the IBO is, the longer and harder that ride will be.
Great comment. Thanks for your contribution
You're welcome. I was platinum so I know what I'm talking about. Honestly, I could have built the business faster if I actually knew what was going on but when I figured it out my conscious would no longer allow me to.
Yeah, I was on the road to platinum also, but I started to figure things out and I didn't like what I saw. Fortunately for me, I didn't lose tens of thousands of dollars like some of the more hard core IBO's.
I had a downline who spent over $100k
How ling was that IBO in Amway to spend 100K? I'm sure my former sponsor spent much more than that but he's been hard core for about 20 years now. Scary that the brainwashing hasn't worn off.
10+ years
Wow, that's a long time dedicated to the cause and taking losses.
That's why you keep people so busy they don't stop and think.
People don't quit because they aren't making money, they quit when they stop believing they will eventually make money. The uplines job isn't to actually help their downline make money, it's to keep the belief that the downline will eventually make money. That's called "keeping the dream alive." Sometimes, you can help them make a few dollars here or there and then you promote that forever.
The other point you bring up is the "cause." Truly help people become better, more disciplined contributors to society and then task them with doing the same for someone else. People who but into the cause won't even give the money a second thought.
Someone may be thinking, "What's wrong with helping someone become a better person? Isn't that a good thing?" In short, yes it is and is the single biggest struggle for someone who wants to leave the business. A great analogy would be a hungry person that I give a big juicy healthy apple to. That's good, right? After all they were starving. But what if I laced that apple with heroin? I wouldn't seem so good anymore would I? That's the way I view the motivational system - a nice juicy piece of fruit that is great for you.... except for the heroin. That heroin is the "Business Owner Mentality" concepts that are wrapped in half truths and used to financially rape IBOs who aren't thinking critically when they are being taught how to "Achieve Their Dreams."
Excellent analysis. I believe you are spot on with that. It is the hopes and dreams that keep people going on even when faced with years of losses. My former sponsor is still at it for over 20 years. He believes in the lifestyle and that he will "eventually" make it. It's sad and a waste of life.
I low level IBO bragging about their "Business Owner Mentality" is akin to a rape victim bragging about why the experience was good for them and their knowledge of how to screw themselves.
Yep we were taught that losing money (at the time) was success because we were "investing" in our financial futures. It was the hope of eventually turning a profit that kept us hoping and going on, despite the facts showing us otherwise. The Amway brainwashing works until you finally snap out of it for good.
For the record, I don't believe that every Diamond is consciously setting out to deceive people. I firmly believe that many of them are just higher level "Ambots." I know of one high level Diamond who preaches "wealth mentality" and applied that to his motivational organization until it almost went bankrupt.
When you get around real world business owners, they are some of the most frugal, disciplined spenders in the world. Real world business owners count EVERY penny and can tell you with accuracy how much money is coming and going. "Wealth mentality" was an excuse for everything - from spending more on products to going to events to staying in the uplines hotel room block for more money than getting you own cheaper hotel (which is an interesting little money making deal as well).
I believe that. They may truly believe what they say, even if it's wrong. Same with downline Ambots who are duplicating.
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