How To Protect Your Company From The Anti-MLM Movement?

How To Protect Your Company From The Anti-MLM Movement?

In the wake of COVID-19, MLMs and direct sales companies started to come under a lot of scrutiny. Not only did the FTC start to focus heavily on MLMs, but many companies had to deal with the wrath of social media. Reddit, TikTok, and Twitter became notoriously anti-MLM. In fact, not a day goes by where an anti-MLM post is not hitting the top results of Reddit, and many anti-MLM TikTok videos are getting tens of thousands of viewers.

This has made running direct sales companies harder than ever. MLM and direct sales companies can be hard to sell. However, now you have the anti-MLM crowd to deal with. Thankfully, there are a few ways that you can protect your company from the anti-MLM movement.

Be Honest About What You Offer

A lot of the critique from the anti-MLM movement stems from the fact that they do not believe that MLMs or direct sales companies and their distributors are being completely forward with their information.

If you are going to make a statement, whether it be about your product or income opportunities, then make sure that it is factual. Back it up with stats. The stronger you make your argument, the less opportunity an anti-MLM follower is going to have to turn people away from your business. They have absolutely no argument if you are going to be presenting them with cold, hard facts.

Nowadays, you should be arming yourself with honest information anyway. Part of the reason why the FTC has been cracking down on certain companies is that they are not all that honest about their claims. The anti-MLM movement may be just what you need to steer your business in the right direction.

Don’t Be a Pushy Salesman 

If you are part of an MLM, then you can make some serious cash by recruiting people into the MLM. This is part of the business model. However, a lot of people get this wrong and believe it to be a pyramid scheme. This then leaves their business open to attack.

If your company gets attacked by the anti-MLM movement, then the chances are that you have been a little bit too pushy with the recruitment side of things. If you want to recruit people into the MLM, then don’t do it out of the blue. This is going to result in you feeling the wrath of MLM-haters.

Be careful about who you approach. Never message somebody out of the blue. That never works anyway. Ease people into the MLM discussion. Choose your prospects wisely. When you find those prospects, make sure that you only convey accurate information to them.

If you are less pushy in your approach, then you will be offering your MLM the best protection possible.

Educate Yourself on the Difference Between a Pyramid Scheme and an MLM

One thing that you are going to be forever attacked with is the idea that an MLM is a pyramid scheme. You know it isn’t. The problem is that many MLMs have trouble conveying this information. As a result, people default to thinking that an MLM is a pyramid scheme. Being a pyramid scheme, of course, has negative connotations.

If you learn the difference between a pyramid scheme and an MLM, you will be giving yourself a good defense.

To put it simply, a pyramid scheme is illegal. The only way to make money from a pyramid scheme is to recruit more people into the scheme. This means that the lower down somebody is in the pyramid, the less chance they have of making cash. In fact, many won’t make any money at all. So you can probably see why they are illegal.

Sure, recruitment is going to be a huge part of an MLM. However, that is not the only way to make money. With an MLM, you can also sell products to bring in the cash. Direct sales companies don’t require recruitment to make money, just selling products. If somebody attacks you and calls your business a pyramid scheme, then tell them no. Tell them that your business operates in a completely different way to a pyramid scheme. If you do this, then you may just find that you can turn a few people away from the anti-MLM movement.

Be Easy to Communicate With 

If you are a part of an MLM, then it is vital that you are easy to communicate with.

One of the major issues that the anti-MLM movement has is the fact that many MLM recruiters just disappear once they have made their cash. Now, it is true that some people do. This is a bad thing. Never do that. If you just disappear, never providing advice to your recruits, then you are going to be an easy target for haters. The anti-MLM crowd is just going to say that you aren’t there to help people make money. They are going to say that you are only around because you want to make money for yourself.

Always make sure that you are reachable by any of your recruits. If they have an issue with something, then do your absolute best to try and help them deal with the problem. Make them feel like they are cared for.

Remember, a lot of the anti-MLM crowd will be filled with ex-MLM recruits. Many of them will be complaining about what they had to deal with in the past. The whole reason why you want to be approachable is that you want to be taking away their main reason to complain. 

Produce Your Own Content

You need to fight fire with fire. If the anti-MLM movement is all over social media, then you need to be on social media too. Defend yourself and your business model. Make sure that you are producing quality video content so you can stand out from the pack.

Remember, if you are going to go down the route of producing your own content, e.g., TikTok videos and the like, then it is vital that you are honest in all of your content. If you aren’t, then you can bet your bottom dollar that the anti-MLM groupies are going to try and pick holes in absolutely everything that you say. 

Heavy Marketing and Branding 

There are a lot of MLMs out there that people do not realize are MLMs. Avon is one of these companies. People see them as reputable businesses, and you will often find that the anti-MLM crowd targets them a whole lot less because it isn’t all that obvious what business they are in.

If you join one of the largest MLMs in the world, then the chances are that they are working incredibly hard behind the scenes to strengthen their brand and fight back against those that accuse them of ill-intent.

If you have formed your own MLM, or you are a recruit for one of the smaller companies, then you need to focus hard on your branding and marketing. Focus on showcasing your products rather than the business model. The products should always be the focal point for any MLM. If you get that right, then the recruits will just find you.

Final Word

Anti-MLM sentiment is getting stronger. You can thank easily accessible media such as TikTok for this. Thankfully, armed with a bit of knowledge, you should be able to protect your business model. Try to be as honest as you possibly can about how your business operates. If you do that, then there is less of a chance that you can be targeted.