Multi Level Marketing - Hybrid/Twist

**allen18328** · 12-22-2009 10:48 AM

I've been thinking a lot the past couple days about multi level marketing. There is a very negative stigma on this type of marketing because of all the scams, but when you think about it it isn't much different from most of the affiliate sites online today. My goal right now is to come up with a twist to MLM that will make it work for everyone involved. I want to come up with a new business and business plan that will be sustainable and will support controlled growth.

This is all I've got so far. Hopefully a few of us can bounce some ideas off eachother. What do you guys think about MLM? Do you think it can be tweaked into a successful plan?

Allen

**allen18328** · 12-22-2009 02:05 PM

Has anyone heard of Incentivized Freebie Websites or "Freebie Trading"? It is a type of affiliate marketing that pays you to refer people to various companies. They pay in cash, but became famous for rewarding with items such as TVs, Gaming Systems, Laptops, etc. Sites such as these have been around for some time and a significant community has formed around them. There is question whether or not the industry will last much longer, but with the increasing popularity of affiliate marketing I think there is a good chance that they will.
My question is this. Almost all of the sites I have come upon pay you only for your referrals. If a site started paying down several levels would this be considered an illegal pyramid scheme? Your source of income would be recruiting new members, but there would be products sold. It would really be no different then the compensation plans already in place except it would spread the profit sharing further.
Thank you in advance for your answers.

Allen

**allen18328** · 12-22-2009 02:14 PM

And I think that if they did that it wouldn't really be a Freebie Site anymore would it? It would be just like any other affiliate network.

**rogercbryan** · 12-22-2009 04:55 PM

MLM is very successful even with the negative stigma. You are talking about a multi-billion dollar marketing technique that has been around for decades. You can change the name all you want...

**Warranties-For-Less** · 12-22-2009 09:32 PM

Interesting,

Having researched thousands of businesses, the one thing that remains constant is that MLM suffers from extremely high level of attrition, or in short, quitters.

There is no way you will ever see success in any business unless you have a product offering true verifiable value, if not exclusive product or service, but which ever business you choose, ask yourself, would I purchase this product or service without the business opportunity attached?

In a recession, everyone is looking for the same thing, to save money, and to earn some extra money, so if you choose a business that saves the masses money, saves them time, as in online shopping, now you will find success. Transfer buying is what I focus on for it is not selling, it is telling, and everyone can do it, so it is easily duplicatible. As example, name brand food, everyone eats, so provide groceries at less cost delivered for free to home and you have a winner.

Success to all,

**allen18328** · 12-22-2009 10:18 PM

I was using IFW's as an example because they are the only thigns I know of that are affiliates to a large group of companies at once. Maybe these companies are just from an affiliate network? I want to create soemthing that enables you to sell/promote a bunch of different things so that you don't have to pick one particular product. For example a site that allows somebody to buy from bodybuilding.com, blockbuster, gamefly, netflix...etc I would then reward them for using my site to shop at those sites and then reward them for referring more people. I don't think it'd be possible to do this for too many levels, but 3 is probably a good bet.

**rogercbryan** · 12-23-2009 09:47 AM

Originally Posted by allen18328

I was using IFW's as an example because they are the only thigns I know of that are affiliates to a large group of companies at once. Maybe these companies are just from an affiliate network? I want to create soemthing that enables you to sell/promote a bunch of different things so that you don't have to pick one particular product. For example a site that allows somebody to buy from bodybuilding.com, blockbuster, gamefly, netflix...etc I would then reward them for using my site to shop at those sites and then reward them for referring more people. I don't think it'd be possible to do this for too many levels, but 3 is probably a good bet.

I agree with part of what you are saying. You are failing to consider that in MLM when you are the offerer of the program a high attrition rate is where you make your money.

**rogercbryan** · 12-23-2009 09:48 AM

Originally Posted by allen18328

I was using IFW's as an example because they are the only thigns I know of that are affiliates to a large group of companies at once. Maybe these companies are just from an affiliate network? I want to create soemthing that enables you to sell/promote a bunch of different things so that you don't have to pick one particular product. For example a site that allows somebody to buy from bodybuilding.com, blockbuster, gamefly, netflix...etc I would then reward them for using my site to shop at those sites and then reward them for referring more people. I don't think it'd be possible to do this for too many levels, but 3 is probably a good bet.

There are already 100,000 sites that do this... Visa, MasterCard, AMEX, Bank of America... hell everyone does this

**allen18328** · 12-23-2009 09:49 PM

Those are all credit cards. Are there actually any affiliate sites that allow you to shop for whatever you want and get paid cash back?

**allen18328** · 12-23-2009 09:57 PM

Originally Posted by Warranties-For-Less

Interesting,

Having researched thousands of businesses, the one thing that remains constant is that MLM suffers from extremely high level of attrition, or in short, quitters.

There is no way you will ever see success in any business unless you have a product offering true verifiable value, if not exclusive product or service, but which ever business you choose, ask yourself, would I purchase this product or service without the business opportunity attached?

In a recession, everyone is looking for the same thing, to save money, and to earn some extra money, so if you choose a business that saves the masses money, saves them time, as in online shopping, now you will find success. Transfer buying is what I focus on for it is not selling, it is telling, and everyone can do it, so it is easily duplicatible. As example, name brand food, everyone eats, so provide groceries at less cost delivered for free to home and you have a winner.

Success to all,

The problem always is that they are selling a product that takes too much work to sell. Its usually not something somebody is going to buy anyway. So what I'm trying to get to is something where you don't have to sell one product. I want somethign wehre a person can shop just like they always would. And when they buy something that they were looking to buy anyway you sitll get a commission from it. Is that out there?

**rogercbryan** · 12-24-2009 10:07 AM

Originally Posted by allen18328

Those are all credit cards. Are there actually any affiliate sites that allow you to shop for whatever you want and get paid cash back?

Yes... you are about 10 years to late for this

**allen18328** · 12-24-2009 11:21 AM

It seems that is my problem with every idea I come up with. Looks like I will have to take the idea and make it better. I saw that sites like ebates.com, rewardlover, and fatwallet are almost the idea I'm looking for. I think I'm going to take this idea and tweak it a little more to emphasize the ability to earn money instead of just save.

A few things I'm wondering is why do so many people try to focus on selling individual products instead of marketing sites that sell everything? It's got to be much easier promoting a site that has everything somebody could need rather than a product that they don't even want.

**rogercbryan** · 12-24-2009 11:54 AM

Originally Posted by allen18328

It seems that is my problem with every idea I come up with. Looks like I will have to take the idea and make it better. I saw that sites like ebates.com, rewardlover, and fatwallet are almost the idea I'm looking for. I think I'm going to take this idea and tweak it a little more to emphasize the ability to earn money instead of just save.

A few things I'm wondering is why do so many people try to focus on selling individual products instead of marketing sites that sell everything? It's got to be much easier promoting a site that has everything somebody could need rather than a product that they don't even want.

I guess I'm not being clear.. this is done... its a dead idea... move on... You are not understanding the basic principle of an online store. If you sell someone else merchandise you get a % of sales as income. If you are trying to pay people to shop that doesn't work as the discounts they can get buying direct from someone else will far out weight any income you would give back to them.

The reason people market individual items is that it is better to work a niche then to throw a whole bunch of stuff together that has no relation... If you want to buy everything and anything try this little site... be sure to keep this quiet as I don't want everyone to find out that these types of sites exist... Walmart.com: Save money. Live better. SHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

**allen18328** · 12-24-2009 12:25 PM

Maybe I'm not being clear. You are not selling another person's/site's product. You are sending them to that site through your site. There are sites that allow you to shop at places such as Wal-Mart and get paid money back for it. These sites are affiliates to wal-mart and wal-mart pays them a commission for sending them customers. As an incentive for you to shop through their site they pay you money back. Therefore the customers are still shopping directly at wal-mart, but they are also saving more because the affiliate site is paying them a percentage of their commission. If Wal-Mart is paying the affiliate 10% and they pay the customer a smaller percentage than that back it's a win-win situation. The affiliate site makes money and the customer saves more than they would have normally.
Ebates.com is doing this with a great deal of success, but I feel they are doing it with more focus on savings than earnings. I'd like to focus more on earnings, the same way other affiliate opportunities do.
If something is dead just because it has been done before there would be very few startups. There would be no new restaurants in town, only one major retailer, one brand of television and so on. Does one need a completely earth shattering idea to be able to start a business?

**allen18328** · 12-24-2009 12:33 PM

This article explains it better than I can. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/28/yo..._r=1&th&emc=th The credit card companies do this, but not many people know about the programs or use them. There are also the two large sites ebates.com and fatwallet that do this, but I think the market is far from saturated. Especially if I narrow it down into a niche market.