School is going to start soon, hee 20 more days, Yeah, so happy.. I know you must be thinking that I'm weird.. Seriously, I rather be in school than slacking at home. At least I can get meaningful for life in school. Furthermore, each day in school is enriching..

So what have I been doing for the past few days? I had been bothered by everything about network marketing, seriously. Have been reading forums about network marketing, particularly DW(Dolphin Warrior, which just doesn't admit that it is a networking marketing firm. They call them a 3-level marketing firm, something like that. Hello, it's a network marketing or MLM firm loh, just that they called it a nicer name to avoid association with the notorious mlm term)

Why am I looking at DW? My best fren joined this firm. I don't know what they said to him or how they impress my fren. My friend just believe that they are so good, that he can really strike rich there. They claim "in the future, all household will own a magnetic mattrass (which costs, $2.4K, and without official scientific evidence, heard about the electrostatic or magnetic therapy provided by some clinic, which was on the news recently? Based on scientific research and testing, that product does not have significant medical benefits. It was reported that perceived benefits felt were largely psychological. I hope that the magnetic bed will not be something similar to it. Perhaps, the experts should start to research on this too. Come on, I don't think any smart, educated consumer would want to pay $2.4 K for just psychological benefits rite.. Anyway, heard that their cost price is only abt $300-500 (might be lower) Isn't that profiteering? For a company with very low overhead costs, literally no marketing effort. Just commission, so that the agents can draw commissions at many levels.

And from various sources of readings, seems like they practice hard-selling, which is like a flaw network marketing concepts. The most powerful weapon in MLM is word-of-mouth publicity, which is one of the most effective promotional tools. It is essentially soft-selling, through reccomendations to friends and relatives, because the agents are using the products and believe that they are really good. This soft-selling essence is supported by top mlm firms in American and European countries. From the forums, it was said that DW and some other mlm firms in singapore teach their agents hard-selling skills. E.g Don't let customer have time to consider buying, pressure presentation to close deal during the first meeting with prospect. They even teach them to kneel to beg prospect to buy as desperate measure..many more lah...

According to Direct Selling Association of Singapore(DSAS) regulation, customers should be given 7 days cooling period to allow customer to consider if they wanna buy, that means no pressure tactics to close sales. Apparently, DW and some others are not registered under DSAS.. Isn't this questionable? Well the above with consumer as the stakeholder.

Right now, from the perspective of the agents themselves(NOT the top mlmers/Boss). I believe the mlm firms are so enthusiatic to recruits so many people because they are the firm's money-trees. I think the agents are something like their customers. The agents will sell to their relatives, family and friends, which they are draw commission. Then the person who recruit the agents, the recruiters can also draw commission from the agents sales, i think for some firm, the recruiter actually draw higher commission than the agents, who painstakingly sell the product.. Confusing huh?.. Ofcourse the residual profit, which is still a very high profit margin goes to the bosses of the firm.

Especially for products that are only sold one, inparishable products. The magnetic beds do not need to be replenished. Thus each relatives, friends will only buy from you once, that's all. Furthermore, probably each family will only buy one(unlikely they will buy 2 in the family, due to the exorbitant price) furthermore, it is unlikely that all your friends will buy from you.. about 30-40% will buy, that is if you're lucky to have supportive and rich network of people you know. So what happen if you are exhausted of prospects that will buy from you. Recruit more people so that you can draw their commission? most probably.

My fren couldn't sell the product, guess what the firm suggested? They asked my fren to put in money into the company. My fren don't wanna tell me the details. From what I read, seems that to buy the product themselves so that they can earn enough points to promote. Means buy promotions la, which is not compensated by salaries, just that they can draw higher commission. So what happens if still cannot sell?

Actually for my fren's firm, you need to maintain the sales level or what they call point value in order to stay at that position level. If you don't, your downlines who sell more than you will climb over you and you get demoted. Means that you cannot draw commission from the ones you recruited. So are you going to pump in more money into the firms? Probably the mlmers call it investment ba.. I call it willingly letting the firm suck you dry... Anyway, seems like my fren is putting in all his savings, I'm really worried for him. I seriously hope that he won't be conned or rather, no be influenced to put in more money.. It's like gambling, you keep thinking that you'll earn back the money some time, some day, just need to continue gambling ("investing" more money).. so what's the outcome? You continue losing and ended up losing more money, worst, you borrowed alot alot of money for the "investment" and ended up in heavy debts.. I hope that my fren will realised the Cons and lopeholes soon..

I'm not saying that all networking marketing is bad. Just that in Singapore, there are very few ethical network marketing firms. Many of them are breakaways from the existing network marketing firm..break and break and break, till mlm firms are so saturated. Many of the bosses do not really have very long experience in professional distribution and selling, many of them are young and main concern is profit.

Network marketing is a relatively modern and good concept, however mismanagement or misuse will cause alot of problems, especially socail and community problems. DW some other firms like NTI has appeared on newspapers a few times for recruting young, gullible, easily impressionable by money opportunities and then influence them negatively. Some of them condemn education and stress than education is not important.. according to some news articles. Some of those less ethical firms really exploit the concept to their benefits, from what I see...

Companies like NuSkin does not have negative feedback from the agents or people. It's a world-wide company, owns the product and product research and development, produce their product, charge resonable price. etc..

If you wanna do network marketing, be sure to find a good firm. A bad mlm firm will definately harm you more than it benefit you.....