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Affiliate Marketing Blog by Shawn Collins

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MLM to Affiliate Marketing

January 27th, 2008 · Comments

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I was laid off from an MLM company as the General Manager, and I am looking to do something online with my recent skills. Would my thirteen months of experience managing approximately 3,700 MLM people can equate into an affiliate management job? What’s the next step?

I’d say that if you are really interested in getting into affiliate management, the first thing you should do is to strike any reference to MLM from your resume.

MLM has a negative connotation among affiliate marketers, so it won’t do you any favor to include it in your credentials.

Whether fair or not, lots of folks consider MLM to be one in the same with pyramid schemes and fraud.

In order to be a good affiliate manager, one thing you need is to be a good communicator. That is not something you’ll necessarily have from a previous job. Either you’re a good communicator or you’re not.

Also, one way to get a good view of affiliate marketing is to be an affiliate yourself. Get your hands dirty as an affiliate to better understand what affiliates want and need.

You should also have a good grasp on the issues in the industry, which you can gain from the industry podcasts, forums, and blogs.

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Tags: Ask Shawn Collins

Viewing 5 Comments

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    With us MLM background is a plus please contact me.
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    • v
    Hi Shai -

    Why do you consider such experience to be an asset?
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    • v
    Shawn,

    While there are many in the world who do have negative connotations attached to MLM, unfortunately, the same can be said of affiliate marketers. There are many in the world of advertising (and outside) who consider "affiliate marketing" to be a dirty business filled with spammers and criminals. However, as both you and I know, affiliate marketing is clean or dirty based upon the marketer, not the business model. MLM and direct sales are no different.

    MLM is a legitimate and proven successful business model over the long term. Globally, MLM and other forms of "direct selling," were responsible for the sale of $109,180,000,000.00 ($109 Billion !!!) world wide in 2006. That's up almost 10% since 2004, and it's continuing to grow (http://www.dsa.org/pubs/numbers/#RETAILCOMPARE ). In 2006 alone, over 58,000,000.00 people were participating as sales people in direct sales.

    In the 1950's when companies like Midas Mufflers and McDonald's realized they could grow ten times faster than conventional companies by offering "franchises," it seemed like a great idea. Many companies jumped on the bandwagon, and there was phenomenal growth. Unfortunately, there were also definitely abuses of franchisees. The media jumped all over the stories of destitute families who lost their life savings through franchising "schemes." Attorneys General from many states got involved, and at one point some U.S. Congressmen even tried to outlaw franchising. Yet the clean companies prevailed, and today, franchises are responsible for over 40% of the retail volume in the U.S. economy on an annual basis.

    MLM and direct sales are looked down upon by some, but why would anyone want to ignore that market or pretend it doesn't exist? As an agency and a network, we certainly don't. We work with legitimate, mutli-million and in some cases billion dollar companies in the industry. They are members in good standing of the DMA, the DSA, the Better Business Bureau, etc., and they have been valuable clients of ours for many years.

    To your commenter who was quoted at the beginning of this thread, we put out an invitation: give us a call. We understand and value your skills and experience, and we'd like to talk with you. We're the leading provider of marketing services to the MLM industry, and we might have a home for you.

    Best Regards,

    Mark Meckler
    General Counsel, COO
    UniqueLeads.com, Inc.
    561-491-2826 ext. 210
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    Thanks Mark - yes, there are definitely lots of legitimate examples of MLM.

    My point was just that it could be a liability for a prospective employee at some companies.

    Affiliate marting certainly has it's detractors, due to the behavior of some bad actors, but I don't think it's in the same league as MLM.

    I think MLM, and I could be wrong for sure, is seen as something of a pejorative by plenty in the mainstream.

    So much of it is semantic - many affiliate programs with 2 tiers probably don't consider themselves to be engaged in MLM, but I would say they're wrong.
    • ^
    • v
    Being laid off from MLM. That's sort of ironic, isn't it!
 

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