"How much can I make if I join, realistically?"
MLM veteran Len Clements says you should not even ask, as it'll not get you a straight answer. It would be a stupid question.Why? Because there are many unknown factors. It'd be like (his metaphor), if you are a great high school basketball player asking a college recruiter "How many NCAA championship rings will I get if I go to your university?"
He is absolutely correct. That would be the "anecdotal fallacy", where one person claim his personal experience can be easily replicated, when we don't know what other factors, such as his personality, his salesmanship, his charm, his friends and family (susceptible to his sales), his social circle (access to market), and so on, would affect his success.
However, I think you should ask the question any way, and I'll explain why.
Why do I think you should ask the question any way? Because it tests the honesty and biases of your upline. I see three general lines of answers:
1) I honestly don't know.
If the upline tells you something along the line of "I honestly do not know, as I have not known you long enough to see your personality, or how fast you can learn sales techniques, or how large is your social circle, or how hard will you sell. So no, I don't know how much can YOU make. I can only tell you that I made this much", then he is being perfectly honest.
Government mandated disclosure rules do: make sure people are honest when it comes to stock deals and most commercial transactions (such as you getting a receipt and so on). Not quite so in MLM.
And this is the answer you really really want: honest and clear. You want information, not a sales pitch.
2) You can make as much as you want! Join now!
If the upline tells you something along the line of "Your success is only limited by how hard you are willing to work! You can make $10000 a week!" then he's just interested in you joining as his downline, not in telling you the whole truth.
This is especially true in the recruitment dependent schemes that's a hair away from being declared a pyramid scheme. The upline is only interested in getting downlines to sign up and hand over money to the company so s/he can "cycle out", and s/he will say ANYTHING to achieve that, including telling you everything you WANT to hear, not everything you *SHOULD* hear. To this sort of upline, you are just another notch on the belt, another "peg" to fill, toward his/her payout.
You don't really want this sort of answer, as this upline don't really have your welfare in mind. S/he is out for him/herself.
3) Uh, the company said this, this, and that!
If the upline tells you something along the line of "Uh, the company says that you can make $$$$$ per week! All you have to do is do this, this, and that! Celebrity ______ endorsed it! It cannot possibly be a scam!" then your upline is so new to the game it's almost pathetic. S/he can only repeat the standard marketing speech, probably read from the standard template (yes, MLMs have standard sales scripts prepared by some uplines or even by the company itself).
This sort of upline was JUST recruited not long ago, probably by someone who gave them the type 2 answer (see above), and thought he could just repeat the standard template, clone the upline, and voila, recruits would be rushing him or her to sign up. The answers just sound too robotic, too polished, or too hesitant.
You don't really want this sort of answer either. You won't get much support, if any. His or her heart may be honest, but s/he is too naive to realized s/he had been tricked if s/he is being tricked.
Do you see additional types? Hybrids of the types above? Is your upline one of the above types?
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