It’s honestly strange I feel the need to do this blog post but it needs to be done and why not me?
There is STILL a massive ignorance about the Network Marketing profession and I hope this helps.
Why This Blog Post?
My wife and I are coaches and trainers for the network marketing profession. We are former number one income earners and now coach and train the profession as a whole and also personally coach MANY top earners in the industry.
A few days a very popular social media guru, Gary Vaynerchuk, talked about the Multi-Level-Marketing profession in a very non-supportive and negative way and it pointed out, yet again, the very skewed and ignorant views about our profession.
Gary Vaynerchuk and the Art of the Hustle
I am a big fan of about 96% of what Gary Vaynerchuk talks about. Hustling, work hard, don’t pretend, be patient, all of that stuff is good stuff. I do worry that the Vayner-generation may produce a lot of rich but extremely shallow and unhappy CEO’s and company owners but that is just my opinion. I do think having balance, seeing your family from time to time is still of value but, for most people, I agree, they DO need to hustle harder and stop wishing.
Following some of the same principles that Gary talks about has allowed our company to hit the Inc 5000 this year (#754) and these kind of principles have helped us amass a decent brand on social media, have million dollar weekends and create a revenue that many companies never see.
However, despite being a paid speaker at MANY network marketing conferences, Gary still has a pretty negative opinion about our profession so I wanted to point out a few things from his livestream he did the other day.
“Not a Viable Business Model”
On September 22, 2016, Gary did this Q and A livesteam where someone asked about the MLM industry. (he talks about it at minute 4:55).
To make it simple, I will just write word-for-word what he says in the video (but feel free to verify)
“I do not believe that multi-level-marketing is a great business model just based on the data. There’s a small percentage of people that make money, the far majority don’t and this idea any business that is predicated, any entrepreneur that is interested in the following model: I’m gonna get D-rock to do something, then D-rock is gonna get someone else to do something and I’m gonna make more money than they do because I’m at the top of the tree and started the process is a bad business model. This thought of passive income, I’m gonna get enough people to do shit and then I am going to be on the beach, pool-side all day and money is going to be flowing in, it’s just not a good model, it’s not sustainable, there’s a couple people that can pull it off, but, I’m just not a believer.”
Again, it’s honestly strange that I feel the need to write this as Gary has spoken for several network marketing companies and I have had the chance to share the stage with him 2 or 3 different times at network marketing related events. But, this is what he thinks of the profession…and, unfortunately, this is what many others think too.
We Got Work to Do
Gary basing his opinion on network marketing in the manner he did would be like me bashing Internet marketing based on some crappy ad I saw on Craigslist. Do SOME people market and pitch network marketing in the manner he described? Yes, and we are trying to stop that but that doesn’t mean all network marketers are slimeballs professing to make money off the backs of others without YOU having to put in work.
There are ZERO professionals I have met in multi-level marketing that make good money that pitch joining their business in ANYTHING close to what Gary describes. He is taking the lowest possible method of pitching network marketing and claiming that for the profession. But, let me be more specific and do a quick breakdown of a few of his statements:
- There’s a small percentage of people that make money – OK Gary, what about customers? Can we have happy customers that just buy the product, how does that fit in your data? Very few small business owners make an actual profit or even stay in business, sounds risky, yikes! Should we avoid owning our own business? Few kids in little league ever make it to the professional paid arena, is that not a good model either?
- any entrepreneur that is interested in the following model: I’m gonna get D-rock to do something, then D-rock is gonna get someone else to do something and I’m gonna make more money than they do because I’m at the top of the tree and started the process is a bad business model. – Well, this is another example of a lack of intelligence about our profession. MOST of the number one earners in a company were NOT the first person in the “tree”, they just out-hustled all the ones above them. When we were number one income earners we were the 1100th people in the deal we outearned every person above us because we were never brought in with just bringing in a “D-rock” or two. And also, are you saying no entrepreneurs should be interested in earning off the efforts of others? Does this mean Keller Williams real estate is a bad business model too? (they get paid multi-levels of commissions based on realtors they refer) or many life insurance companies that also earn commissions off others, are those bad too? Just because you CAN earn off the efforts of others does not mean this is our sole pitch or that any good networker would say “Just get a few rockstars and then you can sit by the pool”.
- it’s not sustainable – Amway does about a billion a month and to my knowledge is the only company to ever pay cash for a sports complex, they’ve been going a few decades, I think they and some others companies may be more sustainable than you think.
The Problem isn’t Really Gary…
I honestly don’t recall the last time I heard as terrible of a pitch that Gary described as how we all pitch. IF you see someone in your team using this ridiculous pitch of do nothing but earn off the efforts of others, please stop them, shake them, and educate them.
I personally don’t care at all if Gary or anyone outside of our profession believes in what we do but we sure as heck should NOT attempt to bring in anyone to our team using the type of verbiage that Gary describes. ALL business is hard work and that includes our profession, the big difference is we DO get to enjoy from the efforts of others which is why many good uplines provide so much training and support for their team.
Instead of attempting to weasel people in, let’s be straight forward and tell people that the business DOES take massive work, the people who would have done good will appreciate it and those that are looking for a fast buck, will go somewhere else, wherever that is, but not in OUR profession.
Again, I agree with MOST of what Gary evangelizes, I have bought all his books and have even written blog posts promoting them. This is NOT to bash Gary but to raise more awareness of what outsiders (even ones that are hired by us) think about our profession.
Did This Help You? If so, I would greatly appreciate it if you commented below and shared on Facebook
Ray Higdon’s Network Marketing Blog
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