How many times have I seen or heard of IBOS lying or trying to trick someone into seeing a plan or trying to get someone interested in Amway. It almost becomes comical when you see tired old lines being used. I used to call it tapespeak because most likely the IBO heard it at a meeting or function or on a tape or audio of some sort.
What is amazing is how some IBOS and their leaders can think that deceiving a prospect is a good idea. In the long term it’s bad for business and significantly affects the Amway reputation in a negative way. I mean who wants to join up in business with people who lied to you? And for that matter, the same can be said if Amway apologists who also lie or tell half truths to defend Amway.
But the reason for lies, half truths, deception and other strategies is because the truth about Amway just isn’t pretty. You can put lipstick on a pig but in the end it’s still a pig. You can fluff up Amway and the opportunity but in the end, about half of all IBOS do nothing and 99% of IBOs or more make nothing or lose money. Factor in expenses for tools and functions and time spent and Amway becomes a financial disaster for many.
If you’re an IBO, be honest with yourself. Do you use the curiosity approach or leave out some information in the hopes of attracting people to the plan? Do you fake success as advised by upline? Do you hide the name Amway unless asked first? If so, you are part of the problem and not the solution.
Joe, you are absolutely correct. So much about Amway is total bad news that anybody trying to push it on strangers has to lie, or at least cover up unpleasant facts.
ReplyDeleteThis systematic lying started in the late 1970s and early 1980s, when Amway's reputation began to go down the toilet. IBOs complained to their up-line that they were having no luck in recruiting new suckers. That's when up-line started to advise them to sugar-coat the company's bad reputation by not mentioning its name, or by trying to disguise the company by claiming that it was "only a small part" of the AMO subsystem.
This is when you get the statement "We're not Amway, but we do handle some Amway products." Or "This isn't the old Amway -- we're a brand-new operation called Quixtar, or WWDB, or Network 21."
It may have worked for a while, but you can't really fool people with that sort of bullshit in the internet age. There's too much information out there, and Amway can't censor it.
Joe, back in the early 1980s, De Vos and Van Andel sent out one of their "Directly Speaking" letters to all Amway Direct Distributors, in all of the AMO subsystems (these Direct Distributors are now called Platinums).
ReplyDeleteIn their letter they said that using the "curiosity" approach to recruitment was absolutely FORBIDDEN. They said that it was counterproductive, since persons were infuriated to find out that they had been lied to. And they said that much of the bad publicity and legal problems that Amway was getting came from this sort of deception and lying.
Did anybody pay attention to them? Nope. The leaders of the various AMOs told Amway in Ada, Michigan to fuck off.