One of the humorous things about Amway IBOs is their ability to say a whole lot without having any substance. They'll talk about how great the business is and how much they have learned and then when you ask if they made any money, you either get dead silence or you get some answer about how they's seen a copy of a check from someone's upline diamond or something like that. But it's very rare that an IBO will be upfront about their earnings. Of course, I can understand that someone brand new might not have made a whole lot, but I have seen some IBOs outright lie and say they've been in Amway a month and they're making $5000 a month or some other tall tale like they are 23 years old and retired. LOL
Even when discussing some Amway released information such as the average earnings of an IBO, you can hear all kinds of excuses provided by Amway IBOs and Amway defenders. They will make excuses like most IBOs do nothing. As if that isn't a problem in itself. Or they make stupid analogies about people signing up for a gym membership and then not doing anything. As if owning a business and exercising are the same thing. I even hear questionable claims about how so many people sign up as IBOs to get lower prices. I chuckle when I hear that because Amway's prices in general, are not competitive with big retailers. I believe that is because Amway must add the cost of IBO bonuses in the cost of their goods and services. While an IBO might save from the full retail price of Amway products, you can (in most cases) find the same or a similar product cheaper online or at Walmart, Costco, Target, or a host of other retailers.Another area where IBOs like to divert the discussion is when the discussion is about the success rate of IBOs in general. Based on Amway's own numbers, less than one half of one percent of IBOs reach the level of platinum. Platinum is the level where allegedly, an IBO either breaks even or starts to make some net profit. It would depend on whether the IBO is involved in the tools and to whet level of participation. But IBOs like to downplay this fact as if people simply did not work hard enough or did not learn enough, rather than simply acknowledging that the system itself might be flawed.
The last area I see issues is when talking about selling products. I suspect that product sales to non IBOs is relatively small. I did a recent blog post called "If you have no sales, you have no business" I believe there may be some exceptional people who can sell, but people in general, do not like to or do not possess the skills to sell products. Yet I see IBOs making all kinds of stories about "selling" to customers. I rarely get a straight answer about product sales as well. The fact that many Amway IBOs can't give a straight answer is quite telling.
Most people are not salesmen, and are unsuited to using the intense high-pressure tactics that a good salesman can employ. So naturally, apart from some temporary pity purchases from friends and family, an Amway IBO isn't going to make a lot of money from retail sales.
ReplyDeleteWhat's the only thing left? Recruitment of a down-line, and compelling THEM to do the selling.
But since they most likely will have no more success than you do, all that they can strive for is to recruit people under them. This is why Amway is a pyramid scheme and a Ponzi racket, no matter what the Federal Trade Commission says.
@April 18, 2024 at 6:15 PM
ReplyDeleteWhat you said is the bottom line. Most regular people aren't salesmen, so have no hope making money selling products to begin with. But even a good salesman will not make a living selling Amway products, because there are only so much soap, detergents and energy drinks one customer can commit to, or are willing to commit to buying every month. To make money from sales, any sales, you either need to sell high value products (cars, houses) where buyers come to you, or huge volumes of products where sell to different customers every month. The latter is not possible in Amway since you can't even advertise. An Amway distributor can only use word of mouth and a personalised selling business. It is not a realistic niche offering for soap, detergents and energy drinks. A real salesman would rather sell cars with better outcomes and less effort. And even for used cars, I would dare to say more self respect.
And besides, even if recruitment was not a pyramid, the persuasion needed to recruit someone to become an active Amway distributor is none other than sales, you need to be persuasive, paint the good side, and close the deal. It is every bit something you need to be a sales person to be good at. And as per the recent blog post on here about a "hard sell", it is not an easy sell to make either. Again any real salesperson would be far better off selling cars, medical equipment to medical practices, software to businesses, just about anything else.
Amway is not a good proposition for sales people.
And it is obviously not a good proposition, but much worse, for people who aren't sales people.