Did Someone Ask You to Look at MLM?

If someone’s asking you to look at network marketing, it’s kind of difficult sometimes, because there’s two ends of the spectrum. 

There are the people who are asking you to do it, and there are people who are telling you not to do it. It’s kind of hard to find a middle ground, or someone who will just very accurately show you both sides. I am not here to get you to do network marketing, and I’m not here to get you to not do network marketing. 

I have been in the network marketing industry for about 30 years. I’ve made many millions of dollars. I consulted a couple of hundred network marketing companies and so I have a different perspective on companies. A lot of times when the “antis” tell you not to do it, they clump everything into one category, whereas I’m able to differentiate between companies, and so I think it’s going to be very helpful. This is going to be an honest discussion, both pros and cons, and where the data is coming from. 

First of all, let me just say that when I first joined network marketing in 1989 my parents said, “Don’t do it.” My sister emphatically said, “Don’t do it. It’s a scam.” I’m sure glad that I took the time to really dig into it and study it and learn it, because it’s made me millions of dollars and I’ve helped thousands of people make millions of dollars. And so I’m really glad that I did it. And I remember saying to myself, “Well, my sister and my parents are not going to pay for my kids’ education or my house, or anything else. This is my responsibility, so I need to really look at it.”And so that’s what I suggest that you do as well. 

I’m sure glad that I took the time to really dig into it and study it and learn it, because it’s made me millions of dollars and I’ve helped thousands of people make millions of dollars.

You already know that there’s always a pro and con. You’ve seen in the Amazon comments that, even if you have a 99% rating, there’s always that one person who’s attacking the heck out of it that product or book that they bought. You’ve seen it on the Yelp restaurants. You wonder, when you see that one negative comment, whether or not they’re with a competing company, because it just is very different from the rest of the comments. There’s always going to be pro and con opinions, but there’s only one fact. That’s the fundamental thing that I’m trying to get at here.

Network Marketing vs. Traditional Business 

Let me just give you the breakdown in a real simple way of what network marketing is. In a traditional company you have these things: You have a building, and you have some executives who get together. These are the dreamers and they say, “Hey, we want to start a company,” and they put together policies of how they’re going to run their company. And then they get some products or a service and they hire some employees, and they create an offer to those employees. And the offer is: “We’re not going to give you any of the upside potential of the company. The upside potential is you’ll keep your job if you work hard.” That’s what a traditional job typically consists of. 

And in network marketing, everything is the same. They have employees who work in their building, but they do their advertising in a different way compared to the traditional way. The way they do their advertising is, if you find the customer, then you earn a commission, and if you find a sales rep, and train that person, then you earn an extra advertising “override,” is what it’s called. It’s just an additional commission because you were the person who brought that rep in. It’s like a human resources person getting a bonus if they hire somebody who does really well. So that’s all that an override commission is. In a network marketing company they say, “Okay, you’re not going to get a salary, but you get the upside potential of what you build.” That’s really all that it is. 

The greatest benefit in MLM is that you get business ownership, meaning the upside potential at a fraction of the cost of being a business owner of a traditional company. That’s the real benefit. 

Network Marketing Requires “Life Force”

Network marketing is simply a vehicle. That’s all that it is. It’s a shell, if you will, and a person can do with it what they want. My two-year-old son Braxton loves the Disney movie, “Cars.” He has a Jackson Storm toy car, and here’s what he does: He’ll take this car and he’ll kneel down on the floor, and the car will be sitting on the couch, and he’ll just sit there and roll the tire and look at it. He’s admiring the heck out of that thing, and he’ll make little sounds like the car makes in the movie. And then he starts driving the thing around the couch and across the arms of the couch and across the back. He’s created a race track out of the couch, and then he starts making the car fly. 

Okay, what’s going on? Why am I talking about this? Well, in any business, and even in a job, what you’re doing is you’re injecting life force into your job, into your business. And so the moment that you put that car down and you ignore it, then of course that’s the way you stop the thing. And so a lot of times, when people don’t invest in their business or don’t do particular actions that are required, then they’re not doing the business.

So when you think, “Oh, well, that person failed,” you don’t know how much life force they injected into their business.

Network Marketing is also not defined by how we generate leads. It’s defined by the Pipeline which is the law of every organization that wants to expand. 

You’ve got to generate leads. You’ve got to get in communication with them somehow. You’ve got to contact them. You set an appointment in some cases, and then you do a presentation of some kind, and then you’re going to follow up with them until you get a yes or a no. That’s the basics of every organization. I’m talking about every college that wants applicants, I’m talking about politicians, I’m talking about a church – every business and organization uses the Pipeline steps to expand.  There is really no such thing as a person who can’t do a business successfully. It’s more like someone unwilling to learn this and get great at each of the steps. 

So for someone to quit, or to fail, and then turn and blame it on the industry, I’m sorry, that’s not truth. It means very simply that they failed to learn these steps. 

The Anti-Network Marketing Propaganda Machine

I want to give you the source of the anti-network marketing propaganda machine. There are six – and that’s it – six anti-network marketers. And they publish PDFs and videos and then that disseminates out to social media and videos and newspaper and infographics, blog post articles, television, etc. 

In fact, in another video episode called Where Did Network Marketing Get Its Reputation? I discuss in detail how the media manipulates your thoughts, how they use certain words to create a negative association, how they omit certain important information that would make that whole concept irrelevant, and how they twist it all up. 

By the way, this same content is what’s been out there being published and republished for 50 years, and the doom and gloom has never happened. It’s never happened. The oldest network marketing company is still in business today. So, all that they predicted to happen didn’t happen. And yet they’re still predicting it’s going to happen. 

Of the six anti-network marketers who have published all of the negative content – five of those people did network marketing and quit, then turned around and blamed the whole industry – not the person that brought him in the business, not their company, but the whole industry. That’s gross generalization. What they’re doing is that they’re pretending to be a victim. And man, people love to be victims; it attracts a lot of people. 

The other person is a self-proclaimed expert in network marketing. He’s never done it. I don’t know how somebody becomes an expert in something when they can’t do it. Maybe I’m old school, but it just seems logical that to be an “expert” at something, you should be able to do it successfully. 

I spoke with one of them, and all I could remember (I grew up in the south), was being around prejudiced people and the way they spoke: there was nothing good about the people they were prejudiced against.  A prejudiced person, prejudiced against anything, is just proof that they’re biased and they’re not looking at the individual. 

• Do you mean to tell me that there’s nothing good about the person who showed you the business?

• There’s nothing good about any of the products?

• You mean there’s nothing good about any of the executives in the company?

• You never learned a single thing the entire time?

Oh, come on! In other words, they’ve lost perspective when they can’t identify one thing, and they become illogical and insane on that subject. 

Here’s the thing, and you’ve got to keep this in mind the entire time you look at anything negative against network marketing: what are they offering you that’s better? 

Really look at that one, because it’s so easy to be a critic of something. But what are you getting done? What are you accomplishing? What are you helping people do? 

 Mr. Anti – Who Are You Helping?

It has to come to a spear tip. Anti and pro have to meet at the top of a spear tip. And where’s that spear tip? Well, in my opinion, it’s about the fact that the industry is still growing strong. It’s still going. So the doom and gloom didn’t happen. Sorry, it didn’t happen. Move on. That’s really my view of it. But the other thing is the concept that the antis are not offering you anything better. 

So, I pulled some statistics, and I’m just using myself as an example as there are a lot of people like me out there. There are people who have done far better than me. So I’m not trying to say that I’m some sort of a king on a hill or something. I’m not. 

• I built a network marketing business from 1989 to 1995 and then I retired for 18 years with a residual check. And then after 18 years of retirement, I wanted to go back in and start again. The first company bought my business back from me, and  then I started anew.

• In the last seven years, I personally, in doing the Pipeline, sponsored 74 people. That’s in seven years. I don’t know any other kind of business that could do that. What kind of business can survive in seven years with only 75 customers? I want you to put that into perspective that it’s not that many people. Those people recruited other people, sold products and recruited other people etc. And the organization grew.

• In seven years, 56 people have made over $1 million on my team.

• There are 22,366 preferred customers. 

• In my network marketing company, 30 people are ranked higher than me, even though I was the first distributor in the company. In other words, they make more money than me.

• Thirty-six people are the same rank as me.

• Eighty-seven people are one rank below me, 379 are two ranks below me, and 1,812 are three ranks below me.

• And here’s the finale: There are 2,344 people who have an average income of $250,000 a year. 

So I ask Mr. Anti, “Who are you helping? What are your statistics? Yeah, you’re an advocate and yeah, you’re a critic of something. What are you an advocate for? If you’ve got something better, then good. I will debate you, if you can show me your statistics and beat it. Otherwise, sit down.”

The True Crisis

Here’s the true crisis: 69% of the people in the United States has less than a thousand dollars in savings. 33% of that are seniors. How are they going to retire? They can’t retire. They’re going to work until they drop. 

And so in conclusion: with a job, you get a steady paycheck. If you want to choose that route, my recommendation is to not spend half of your money. Put it away. If you only make $40,000 a year, you’re going to have to live your whole life in a reduced lifestyle. That’s the way you’re going to make it. But you’ll come out on the other side, to where you have money. These people who have less than a thousand dollars are one water heater breaking, one transmission falling out of the car, one illness away from destitution. You don’t want that. There’s no security in that. And so, if you want a job, that’s the way to do it. Get your job, get a good one, and just live on half your income. Save the rest of it. 

Or else, do network marketing. If you want the upside of it, you have to work. Don’t believe the hype that it’s kind of like buying a lottery ticket. Just because you’re on the winning football team doesn’t mean that you make it. So even if things are growing really well, you have to work. You’ve got to pull your load. And that’s the one thing about network marketing: you’re paid on production, and not paid to show up.

 So don’t believe anything anyone says about how you can make money in network marketing, other than doing the Pipeline. The Pipeline is what you will learn and get great at. But if you do, and here’s what I said, “If I’m going to get good at something, I might as well get good at something that can make me a whole lot of money.” That was my thinking when I was in the military and I did this part time for two years. The advantage is a lower investment than a traditional business. 

“If I’m going to get good at something, I might as well get good at something that can make me a whole lot of money.”

Thank you so much for reading this. I really appreciate it. Comment down below, and tell me what you think. I’m always interested to read what you have to say.

PS: If you don’t have a team, haven’t recruited anyone (or less than 10 people), this is THE course you should get – Network Marketing Training Course