Tips for Amway IBOs

I have been thinking what I would have done differently, had I known all the things I experienced with my upline, before I joined the business. Hindsight is always perfect and if you are an active, excited Amway IBO like how I was, then you can learn from my experience. You may not fall into the same traps and flawed thinking like I did, but overall, you may find some of these tips useful. You can think of me as your anonymous upline, if that may help :-).

See if your upline is really concerned about your overall success in life or only for success in your Amway business.

For example, is your upline giving you right advice about job? Does he/she feel good when you succeed in other arenas of life or do they feel threatened? If you get a job promotion and a salary hike, do they feel threatened that you may not be motivated to build your business anymore? If you change to a better job, do they feel threatened? If they do, then you need to be careful about taking their advice on such matters.

If you are in a software engineering profession like me, then are you keeping up with what the industry needs and increasing your skill set? Or are you super-confident that you will go diamond in the next 5 years and do not care about updating your skills? I had to put in almost a year after I quit Amway to upgrade my skill set and get new job offers. It was tough, because for 6 years I was under the false confidence that I would go diamond in 5 years and did not care to upgrade my skills! Yes, it was my mistake, not my upline’s. Don’t make that mistake - Do not be over confident until you are making more than $100,000/yr in profits through your Amway business and have very solid groups. Even then there is a chance that it may not last, but at least until then, don’t think you can goof up at your job.

I had an upline who told in his BBS (maybe it is on his rally CD too) that he worked only for 3 hours in a month (not in a week or a day; yes, a month) in his consulting job and make a six-figure income. This was good to hear. Who wouldn’t want that kind of a job? But can you do it and do you want to do it?

Does your upline care about how much savings and investments you have? Do they feel threatened if you buy a home or have outside interests in investment opportunities? Do they feel threatened if you are good at day trading?

If you are a student, is your upline encouraging you to finish your degree or asking you to quit it? This could be one big deciding factor about whether they really care about you and your future. Think about this - if you were their own son or daughter, would they ask you to quit college? Will they ask you to take up a mediocre job so that you can “focus” on your Amway business more? I remember one diamond, Vinnie Pappalardo (BWW), whose daughter wanted to quit college and he was OK with that. Maybe she is successful at Amway and is making enough money. Good for her! But is that right for you? Why can’t you succeed at both college and Amway? They are not mutually exclusive.

Is your upline using your job/educational qualifications as a promotional tool? It will feel so good to you when your upline talks about you, telling what a great person you are, especially in front of your downline and crosslines. The message for other people is that if such a great person needs this business, then the others (who are not as good as you) definitely need it. You get a false feeling of pride, but don’t let that flatter you too much. Your past success is just one more promotional tool for your upline!

What about your health? Does your upline encourage you to work out at least 30 minutes a day? Or are they telling nutrilite will take care of you?

If Amway really makes your overall life better, then they cannot just give lip service. Majority of the IBOs need to succeed in all areas of life. So far, I have only seen people goofing up with several areas of life, thinking they will succeed in Amway, only to realize several years down the road that the profits are not enough and they have also missed out on life... some like me have a very tough time to quit, because we are over confident. But the numbers don’t lie - I mean the numbers that show how much you got in your bank account. You need to be honest with yourself and bite your ego to quit, if you are not happy looking at how much you got.

Ultimately, you are responsible for your own life, so be wise and do not fool around in other areas of life until you are making substantial income through your Amway business.