If you had ever asked this question to your sponsoring IBO or the IBO who invited u to see the plan, you would have gotten a funny look ( Meaning of the funny look: u dumbo, u are questioning the success of a $8 billion corporation?...what world are you from?..Can’t you see the success in the room, in the Achieve magazine, in the lifestyle videos?)
If you had ever watched the profile video of a charismatic double diamond, when this question was asked to him, with this characteristic eyebrow arched look of utter disbelief, he would ask you back....how you could ask this when there are factors like hard work, faith and belief which can't be compared and would tell you apples and oranges can’t be compared. He would go on to tell you that the average income of an IBO is mentioned on paper by Amway and he would answer this question back with a question "DO YOU WANT TO BE AVERAGE?". Do you get the point, there are no real answers for real questions. All the techniques learnt from books will be put to full use to circumvent your real questions and real concerns.
Coming back to the question of "What is your chance of Success"? and similar questions -specifically questions about "income from the business", "number of people that you have sponsored in the business", “"number of people that you have in your team" – You will realize from the so called positive programming of the system that these are strict no no questions to ask your upline.
While these same people who give you funny looks when you question them about your chance of success in the business, they will go to great lengths to cover about negative statistics about everything else on the planet. For eg: These are things u will regularly hear in the system:
1) Social security.gov says 98% of people will be broke or have to depend on somebody else by the time they reach the age of 65.
2) About 85% of non-franchise type businesses fail in the first 5 years.
3) Unemployment rate
4) Increasing number of people who have lost their homes ( in the recent past, the bigger pins had such a great time boasting about how their predictions that the economy would plummet has come true. Seemed like these guys were looking forward to the bad economy)
5)Conventional businesses don’t break even in their first 5 years of business (Dude if you have been in the business for 5 years or more and you still did not break even in so called low investment Amway business, you should seriously re-think, or rather start THINKING)
Another common thing, you will hear in the system is “Numbers don’t lie”. Okay agreed. Let’s look at this phrase in the context of the Amway business. One of the things that is constantly promoted is that if u showed 5 plans/week for at least 90 days straight, you will definitely start platinum qualification.
During functions and seminars or open meetings, big pins from stage ask who showed 5 plans/week in the last 3 months- just look around and see how many people stand for that. In a function, from a crowd of about 3000 people u will see about less than 50 people stand up when this question is asked. And if you take a close look at them, you will notice that they will be mostly be silvers and above. Again you can argue, see what they promote in system is true right, if you showed 5 plans/week you will start platinum qualification. But the problem is many of them have been silver and above for many many years and one of the reasons they show 5 plans/week is that they have some group- and they show 5 plans / week in depth- meaning they show plan for many new people on their team. Again, I am not saying nobody other than silvers and up shows 5 plans / week nor am I saying that nobody can succeed in this business- but do look at the number of people who do this- you see, NUMBERS DON’T LIE AFTER ALL.
The main reason for this promotion of 5 plans/week which not even 5% of the IBO’s can accomplish is because once you are subjected to this heavy programming, u will stay in the business thinking it will work when you show 5 plans/ week or even when you decide to leave, you will have the feeling that you did not show 5 plans/week and that is why the business did not work for you.
Every time you counsel with your upline, you ask them why the business is not working as fast as you want it to work, you will be asked “Are u showing 5 plans / week?, Come talk to me when you show 5 plans/week blah blah blah.” The so called counselling sheet you take to your upline for the counselling session, will have many questions like the number of PV cheques you have, the number of people on SOT on your team, the number of people coming to association, the number of plans u showed, the number of contacts u made, the retail volume you did, etc. However, there won’t be a few very important questions vital for running a business like “HOW MUCH MONEY YOU MADE LAST MONTH, OR THE MONTH BEFORE THAT, OR THE YEAR BEFORE THAT’? or “ WHAT WAS YOUR EXPENSE LAST MONTH OR THE MONTH BEFORE THAT, OR THE YEAR BEFORE THAT?"
One thing you will commonly hear from the system is, if social security says that only 2% people are financially independent at age 65 after years of hard work, what is your chance that you will be financially independent by just working a job. By the same measure, if the average IBO income is $110 - what do you think is your chance of making it to the projected emerald and diamond 6 figure income shown in the plan?
The so called residual income and all the talks about once a leg goes platinum u continue to get $800/month is only by assuming all your legs( 3 organizations to go emerald and 6 to go diamond), qualify month after month. The number of IBO's who reach founders every year is probably less than 5%. Next time when u go to your summer conference, listen to how many diamonds talk about their recent diamond trip or trip to Peter island (or look at the number of diamonds part of your system, who are in the diamond club pictures you received) . If they are not talking about their trip to diamond club, they did not qualify as founders diamond that year, probably they never went diamond after their first year of diamondship.
Again, “What is your Chance of Success in the Amway business”?, this question can only be answered philosophically like, “ 100% for the ones who decides to pay whatever price it takes to succeed in this business”? ... “ Look at the man in the mirror and he is responsible for your level in the business” , “ You are exactly where you are in your life, because of your choices” …..etc, etc, etc.
Nice post! Hope the "active" IBOs read this.
ReplyDeletei remember listening to 1 talk made by bill britt in which he says his success rate in sponsoring was over 80%. he also says he went thru first 19 NOs and then sponsored 1, and then went thru another 19 NOs... but he kept on going! he says once you show 20 or 30 plans, then you just get it!
another cd i listened told "show 10 or sponsor 2, every month, whichever comes first. if you are not sponsoring 2 out of 10, then you need to get with your growing upline and he will tell you what you are doing wrong..." the funny matter is when i went to my upline (who talks on stage at functions) after showing 12 to 15 plans per month for 6 months and not getting any results, he asked me to DO WHATEVER IT TAKES... the fact was he was showing 10 plans or something per month and not sponsoring anyone either!!!
nothing can be measured in numbers! if you question them, they say you don't have faith, belief or you think negative or some such wise bull s#!t.
what is the fastest way to become broke? listen to the "in-debt" & fake amway platinums and follow exactly what they say! you will not only go broke, you will also get into lots of debt!!!