One of the anonymous commentors on my site has shared his Amway/Quixtar Story. You would not get to hear REAL stories like these in the opens, pase or on CDS. But sadly this is the story of 99% of the IBOs.
"Just like yourself I got started about a decade ago and I graduated top of my class and got multiple job offers. RIght around the same time, I was exposed to this opportunity by a person who went to school with me. I saw the plan and it made sense. I loved the association where people spoke positive and felt these are group of people who are growing somewhere in life. I started showing the plan and noticing most of friends and families were not excited about it. I felt that I will prove them wrong by succeeding.
As I was making good enough money from my workplace, I wasn't counting money for the standing order, 300 PV (1000$) and the trips to New Jersey where the leaderships were happening. We were 11 wide paying 7 PV checks and were profitable. I liked everything what the business has to offer, what the speakers said and the whole nine yards. When things did not happen, I did not google the internet to hear other people's experiences. I was part of Rishi and Shampa's team who were new Emeralds. Very aggressive funny couple. There are lot of doctors who were involved which gave great credibility to the whole thing.
Main problem started when one of the uplines decided to go Q12 and Emerald. They said " We are counting on you". I had vowed that I will do everything in my side to make it happen and so are my cross lines. Upline went Emeralds and we were talk of the town as we were one of the people who made it happen. There are few months where we did personal 2000-3000 PV. We had about 40 people in our team and we did not make anyone buy extra stuff as we were not comfortable doing that. Uplines directly did not force like Exeagle case, but since we knew them for 4-5 years at that time, they said stuff like "whatever you do for uplines someone will do it for you".
Since we were making good money we made it happen. We had extra E-Springs, Atmospheres to make the entire city clean. Finally the day came where I lost my job and my wife was taking care of the household. Within months, she lost her job and we were making roughly about 800$-$1000$. We were spending about 1000$ on the products and another 300$ on tools, associations etc. Whatever we were spending before, we had to slow down and watch what we are spending. Uplines who had set higher goals had the same expectations that " we will do whatever it takes". The moment we talked about our financial situations and what is happening, they said not to worry and focus on the business. Well, the months of qualification started and we couldn't do extra volume other the regular 300 PV (even that looked like a big chunk and we started charging in the credit cards). The moment we backed of and started talking about financial situation, they started putting us through guilt and saying stuff like , "Are you fired up'?" What happened to you? Can't you retail? Retailing can take care of your financial situation?
Uplines starting calling our people and started mentioning that they need to stretch to make things happen. We had built tremendous relationships with our team and they were comfortable with us all the time and after they started getting calls like these from uplines they expressed their dissatisfaction about getting calls during work hours, late hours and felt pressured. I brought this to my uplines attention and they got defensive and they mentioned that everything they did was to help my team go. I had told them that I am not comfortable with this pressurizing and told them to slow down and back off.
This was the time I really slowed down to think what me and my wife have accomplished for the past 7 years. We had a sizable group making about close to $1000 bucks but again whatever we built , our uplines destroyed and our team started to exit away. Long story short, I started seeing the rift between my downlines and uplines. Even though everybody seems to be having good time, there were lot of undercurrents. There was a Q12 ruby in our diamonds team (Bald Bengali couple) who always built the business with many people. He was going Emerald 10 years back. He is yet to go Emerald. Rishi and Shampa, our upline Emeralds were talk of the town when I got started. He was like a body guard to Kanti Gala and were powerful speakers. Now I am not sure they are building the business.
The last Emerald in our uplines team was my uplines which was several years back. I am just talking about upline Diamondship which is TD and Suparna. If the business is growing in leaps and bounds, wouldn't you expect more people to go Platinum, Emerald and Diamond. I am not talking like it is everyone else responsibility to move on. I slowed down and looked at my financial cash-flow. My wife and I worked hard to find a good job. It doesn't have the promises of business but at least I felt I do not have to give false promises to people saying in a period of 6 months, you will make $3000. I am able to sleep better. When I was actively building the business, my uplines gave lot of guilt trips. My sister was getting married. We went home for four days and behaved like guests. On the outside we said we built the business for the family. Inside we hardly spent time on anything.
Anything we enjoyed we had a side order of guilt which was killing us. Last three years we took good vacations, cruises, everything self paid but no debt. What is my conclusion? If you have a good upline who lets you be you and build the business with right mindset who never pushes you for volume and never pushes you to buy extra tools (when you already have it), keep building it. Build it once, build it right. Please do not manipulate your hard earned relationship to get PVs. I enjoyed the business when I built it right. The moment my uplines started pressurizing my team, my fun ended and they lost us and our team. Now, they might have to do the same thing with different set of eyeballs (maybe talk about us as someone who lost their dream, whatever!). This is not the way I choose to lead my life.
It is very true. We had the same experience. When our upline going platinum, we were given all false hopes and we had a lot of personal orders. And when there was a situation where we needed help, we were told that "this is a business, and you have to handle it". When we told that we do not want Standing Order, uplines were furious and started telling all sorts of magic words to keep us in that. Eventually, I came out and saved a lot.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, 99% of people who are doing this business, had they know real business knowledge would not accept for these kind of support materials which eats 99% of your money.
Retail? Does that exist? Come on, Amway is an internal consumption model with a horrible break-even ratio.
ReplyDeleteI saw dozens of people in my own group being pressured to do just the thing you are talking about.
MLM compensation plans require 99% plus failure in order for one person to break even. Even if you built the business with your "right" mindset, 99% of those in your business will always be operating in the red.
The problem begins at the core of the model with a horrible compensation plan the rest escalates from there.