This is a quick follow up to my look at ForteBuilder and Cyber Incomes Inc. and the MLM company they are associated with New Vision International. If you read the last entry you will remember that ForteBuilder and Cyber Incomes Inc. were merely a sponsor and recruiting system for the real company of New Vision International, even if they didn’t tell as much in all the computer generated e-mail traffic they sent me. In fact, I am not sure when in the process they would get around to telling me that since it seemed they were more interested in getting you on their roles and collecting their $19.95 a month fee for their assistance in your having a successful business. Since I couldn’t tell if that meant recruiting for you or just sending you more computer generated e-mail traffic telling you to do what they did I decided to forgo forming an alliance with them.
I did become interested in New Vision International however and decided to take a look. The Google search that lead me too their web site was really where I should have started looking in the first place. Here is where I found out information about the product, or should I say products. Where the best I could get out of ForteBuilder and Cyber Incomes was that the product was an Acai juice, the New Vision International web site showed that they did more. The main product seems more like diet systems that are centered on the use of Forte juice (the Acai juice spoken of), Mangosteen juice and OrganicGreens®. You can of course buy the stuff outside of the diet packages, as well as other vitamin and mineral supplement products.
Now the amazing thing is I could find out about the products content, size and price with very little effort on this web site. Well done. I was even able to find out that the company was founded in 1995 by the President and CEO BK Boreyko, is based in Scottsdale, Arizona, is family owned and operated, and is raking in many dollars for their efforts. In other words they appear to be a successful organization though since they are privately held I cannot see the financial statements that would tell the real amount of their profitability.
The web site goes on to tell BK Borelyko’s story of how he was living in Canada working in another unnamed MLM that went under that was the driving force behind starting the new company.
Now the really, really amazing thing about the web site is they are recruiting new members directly and explain all the things that didn’t seem to be too important to ForteBuilder Cyber people that were trying to recruit me. They even have a page or two (several in fact) dedicated to the Compensation Plan. Amazing, simply amazing.
Did I sign up immediately with my new found information, and did I sign up directly with the company figuring that if ForteBuilder and Cyber Incomes couldn’t even tell me what the product was how could I trust them to relay any relevant information on the MLM building side of things, and was I all jazzed up about starting another new venture into the world of nutrition?...Nah.
Although the product sounds good it is still $36.95 retail for a 32 ounce bottle with no extraordinary claims that go with it. There are really quite a lot of this types of products on the market today as I said before and many sell for as little as an eight the price. The member price is only $32.95 which is not a very big margin for a retail business meaning the real program is again a friends and family signup MLM kind of business.
So on the MLM side is it worth it? There is an annual fee to be a member is called a Content Management Fee and is a lot more reasonable at $5.95 but what does it do exactly, I am not sure, but they say it is to help them cover content cost and that it is not a franchise fee I am guessing there are legal issues there. There is an order form that had my number pre filled in; the same number issued to me by ForteBuilder/Cyber Inc., how convenient for them. There is also information on where you can and can’t sell the product, which seemed kind of limiting.
But what about the compensation plan? It is there, listed as well as short video synopsis staring the company president and CEO BK Borelyko. Does it make sense? Not to me. I am beginning to think it might just be me. I have run across a couple of these things now and there are many similarities but it is still in a completely new language, one that I am not yet familiar with. There are many different levels, up lines and down lines, team building, and more, some of which make some sense or at least there is something there enough for me to make assumptions on however they could be all wrong.
It is all the other talk that gets my head spinning. Talk of QV (qualifying volume) or CV (commissionable volume), dynamic levels, directors, and about a dozen bonuses that you may or may not qualify for depending on your group and QV/CV for a given volume period. You become one of these if this happens and you get this if that happens and you become one of those if two of them are under you which means…ugh stop already, my head is hurting. Not really, but come on. Why be upfront with as much as you have to this point only to lose me in this game called compensation plan. You even tell me not to get too concerned if I don’t understand it now because I will in time. Hooey. Hogwash.
I think it was Warren Buffet that said (and I am paraphrasing here) that if it can’t be explained simply on a paper napkin over lunch then it is too complicated and he would not invest in it. That might have kept him out of a lot of good high tech companies but it also kept him out of a lot of nonsense as well. There is no reason to make the rules of the game so hard to understand. On the other hand, those that get to know the rules and understand them are in a much better position to win that game and in the world of MLM that is why there is a small group of people in each company that win and win big. They understand the rules, play the right game and take home all the bonuses, the same bonuses that they brag about to get you interested in playing the game in the first place.
So until I understand the language (and I am beginning to think there are common threads throughout the MLM world) I will not understand the rules, and until I understand the rules I will not have much chance at winning the game, and until I have a reasonable chance at winning at the game I will not play that game but will instead look for another better game to play. One I can understand and one I have an honest shot at winning.
O.K. so I wasn’t very quick in my feedback, but doing your homework does take a little time and look at how much more I was exposed to MLM wise. I think I am a little wiser for the effort. I am a numbers guy and if I can’t see through the numbers or crunch them to the point they work then I know it is time to start looking elsewhere. After I had looked at the product and its pricing I knew this was not for me but I dug deeper and came away with a little better insight on the business side of things.
This is Ed Nef with a view from the Farr West.
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