Network Marketing - The Bad
This is probably the post that most people are looking forward to, will I really tell you all the bad things about network marketing, given that I have a successful network marketing business myself? Well yes of course I will!
Not everything in network marketing is good, in fact there are some really awful people, companies and practices in the industry. If you are considering network marketing as a career choice you probably want to pay close attention to this post.
Lets start with the bad companies - now I am not going to name companies specifically so this section will be pretty short. A bad network marketing company can be a lot of different things, firstly if there is no product to sell you need to run a mile right now! That's not network marketing, that's a pyramid scheme and they are totally illegal in most parts of the world. you only have to think about this logically for a few seconds - if there is no product to sell then there is no income from sales then how on earth do you get your commission? The answer is because everyone pays to join so the people you sign up under you will bring you in some money in the short term but its only those at the top of the pyramid that make any real money, eventually the pyramid becomes too big and unsustainable and it collapses, leaving the people at the bottom out of pocket. Just don't go there!
In fact stay away from any company that says you MUST recruit. Now recruiting is a genuine part of network marketing, most of us will recruit team members because we are trying to grow our businesses into something even more profitable. That being said there is no reason why you need to recruit if you are only looking to make a small amount of extra cash. You should be able to make that on your sales commissions alone, if not something is off. If you MUST recruit so many people to stay active or anything similar please run a mile because although there may be a product somewhere, what you are being told about sounds way more like a pyramid scheme. The focus should always be on the product.
Also stay away from companies that have a minimum order to stay active policy. This might be a minimum monthly spend for example. Network marketing is not a smooth ride and you might not always make your targets through genuine sales, this will only force you to spend your own money buying things you don't need to keep up your targets to stay active or risk losing your business. No company should require a minimum spend just to keep your business active, its simply not fair. On this same note, stay away from companies that will promote you then take the promotion away if you don't do well the next month. I know several of the big names in network marketing do this - you meet a specific target and get a promotion and a fancy new title to go with it! You are all excited until you realise that you need to keep meeting this target to keep your fancy new title, just don't go there because again it encourages you to spend your own money to keep your position and its just a bad idea.
Ok lets move on to bad people - there are many bad people in network marketing, and probably not for the reasons you think. Of course there are the obvious ones, the pushy ones always trying to convince you to buy this or join that, those are not necessarily bad people, but they are desperate ones! You do not want to go into business with someone who is that desperate. Think about it you wouldn't invest in a struggling brick and mortar business so why would you invest your money by joining the team of someone who is struggling.
There are also a lot of people out there who are only interested in their own business. Sure they will be interested in you while they try to get you to sign up and for the first while after you have done but if you aren't a sales superstar right off the bat they will quickly lose interest. That's because if your sales aren't great you aren't helping their business that much and they would rather spend their time with people who are making money for them. What they don't realise is that with the right help and support just about everyone can be successful in network marketing, its one of the beauties of the business. Heck I stopped selling for my previous company almost a year ago and I don't think my upline have noticed yet! I only ever heard from my team leader once when I had asked a question on our group facebook page and she messaged me directly rather than talk about something negative on a page that others could see.
Probably the worst people in network marketing are the hardest ones to spot. I'm not even sure I know what to call them, they are just the people that give you the worst advice, usually trying to get you to spend more of your own money. The ones that tell you that you cant sell a product that you don't use yourself so therefore you need to buy XYZ products yourself and if you haven't then that's why your aren't selling them. Now while I agree with the basic principle that it makes sense to buy from yourself (if you wear make up and also sell make up it makes sense to wear the make up you sell for example) and that by using the products yourself it makes it easier to show people them, most companies will give (sell) you a starter kit for just this reason. Basically the people I am talking about are the ones that tell you that you are the problem, that your not selling enough products because you are not passionate about them, or you don't own them and use them yourself etc etc. I sell a lot of products I don't use because you don't need to use a product to understand it, that's the difference - you need to understand your products, that does not necessarily mean you need to use them.
The people who don't support you are the worst, the people that think that you are the problem. The ones that say that you don't put in enough effort or even the ones that just don't answer your messages. Now we are all in network marketing for a flexible business and no one should ever expect their messages to be replied to right away but when your messages go unanswered for days or even weeks at a time its hard to maintain a good working relationship. These types of people are also usually the people who will get on your case for not selling enough products or similar complaints. It's hard to stay away from these people because you likely wont know that they are like that until after you have joined, my only advice would be to try and get to know someone a bit before you join their team and get an idea of what they are like and how they work their business. This is one of the reasons my company lets people join our team page when they are considering joining us, it lets them see what we are really like as they are free to scroll all the way through and look at every conversation that has ever been had on that page should they wish to do so.
I could probably go on for ages about the bad things in this industry. It's getting harder and harder for people to tell the good from the bad and it's giving the industry as a whole a bad name. I guess what I would say is do your research, see if you can chat to people who work with the company before you make a decision. My best bit of advice - if something sounds too good to be true then it probably is! If someone promises you that you will earn thousands of pounds every single month by doing very little then one of two things is at play here - they are either really overselling their opportunity, or the whole thing is a scam! Just stay away from get rich quick schemes and do your own research and you will do fine.
Not everything in network marketing is good, in fact there are some really awful people, companies and practices in the industry. If you are considering network marketing as a career choice you probably want to pay close attention to this post.
Lets start with the bad companies - now I am not going to name companies specifically so this section will be pretty short. A bad network marketing company can be a lot of different things, firstly if there is no product to sell you need to run a mile right now! That's not network marketing, that's a pyramid scheme and they are totally illegal in most parts of the world. you only have to think about this logically for a few seconds - if there is no product to sell then there is no income from sales then how on earth do you get your commission? The answer is because everyone pays to join so the people you sign up under you will bring you in some money in the short term but its only those at the top of the pyramid that make any real money, eventually the pyramid becomes too big and unsustainable and it collapses, leaving the people at the bottom out of pocket. Just don't go there!
In fact stay away from any company that says you MUST recruit. Now recruiting is a genuine part of network marketing, most of us will recruit team members because we are trying to grow our businesses into something even more profitable. That being said there is no reason why you need to recruit if you are only looking to make a small amount of extra cash. You should be able to make that on your sales commissions alone, if not something is off. If you MUST recruit so many people to stay active or anything similar please run a mile because although there may be a product somewhere, what you are being told about sounds way more like a pyramid scheme. The focus should always be on the product.
Also stay away from companies that have a minimum order to stay active policy. This might be a minimum monthly spend for example. Network marketing is not a smooth ride and you might not always make your targets through genuine sales, this will only force you to spend your own money buying things you don't need to keep up your targets to stay active or risk losing your business. No company should require a minimum spend just to keep your business active, its simply not fair. On this same note, stay away from companies that will promote you then take the promotion away if you don't do well the next month. I know several of the big names in network marketing do this - you meet a specific target and get a promotion and a fancy new title to go with it! You are all excited until you realise that you need to keep meeting this target to keep your fancy new title, just don't go there because again it encourages you to spend your own money to keep your position and its just a bad idea.
Ok lets move on to bad people - there are many bad people in network marketing, and probably not for the reasons you think. Of course there are the obvious ones, the pushy ones always trying to convince you to buy this or join that, those are not necessarily bad people, but they are desperate ones! You do not want to go into business with someone who is that desperate. Think about it you wouldn't invest in a struggling brick and mortar business so why would you invest your money by joining the team of someone who is struggling.
There are also a lot of people out there who are only interested in their own business. Sure they will be interested in you while they try to get you to sign up and for the first while after you have done but if you aren't a sales superstar right off the bat they will quickly lose interest. That's because if your sales aren't great you aren't helping their business that much and they would rather spend their time with people who are making money for them. What they don't realise is that with the right help and support just about everyone can be successful in network marketing, its one of the beauties of the business. Heck I stopped selling for my previous company almost a year ago and I don't think my upline have noticed yet! I only ever heard from my team leader once when I had asked a question on our group facebook page and she messaged me directly rather than talk about something negative on a page that others could see.
Probably the worst people in network marketing are the hardest ones to spot. I'm not even sure I know what to call them, they are just the people that give you the worst advice, usually trying to get you to spend more of your own money. The ones that tell you that you cant sell a product that you don't use yourself so therefore you need to buy XYZ products yourself and if you haven't then that's why your aren't selling them. Now while I agree with the basic principle that it makes sense to buy from yourself (if you wear make up and also sell make up it makes sense to wear the make up you sell for example) and that by using the products yourself it makes it easier to show people them, most companies will give (sell) you a starter kit for just this reason. Basically the people I am talking about are the ones that tell you that you are the problem, that your not selling enough products because you are not passionate about them, or you don't own them and use them yourself etc etc. I sell a lot of products I don't use because you don't need to use a product to understand it, that's the difference - you need to understand your products, that does not necessarily mean you need to use them.
The people who don't support you are the worst, the people that think that you are the problem. The ones that say that you don't put in enough effort or even the ones that just don't answer your messages. Now we are all in network marketing for a flexible business and no one should ever expect their messages to be replied to right away but when your messages go unanswered for days or even weeks at a time its hard to maintain a good working relationship. These types of people are also usually the people who will get on your case for not selling enough products or similar complaints. It's hard to stay away from these people because you likely wont know that they are like that until after you have joined, my only advice would be to try and get to know someone a bit before you join their team and get an idea of what they are like and how they work their business. This is one of the reasons my company lets people join our team page when they are considering joining us, it lets them see what we are really like as they are free to scroll all the way through and look at every conversation that has ever been had on that page should they wish to do so.
I could probably go on for ages about the bad things in this industry. It's getting harder and harder for people to tell the good from the bad and it's giving the industry as a whole a bad name. I guess what I would say is do your research, see if you can chat to people who work with the company before you make a decision. My best bit of advice - if something sounds too good to be true then it probably is! If someone promises you that you will earn thousands of pounds every single month by doing very little then one of two things is at play here - they are either really overselling their opportunity, or the whole thing is a scam! Just stay away from get rich quick schemes and do your own research and you will do fine.
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