My answer is No.

Now, I’m sure a lot of people disagree with me, but I’ll explain my reasons in just a moment.

Let me firstly say, that when my interest started in ‘business opportunities’ all those years ago, network marketing (also know as multi level marketing) really appealed.  Hey, what could be better than being paid for the work other people do!

Well, the reality isn’t quite that simple.  I was really into ‘business opportunities’, and I bought tons of stuff and studied loads, tried lots of different things, but the more I did this, but more my ideas started to mature.

Over time, I became less and less interested in ‘opportunities’, and much more interested in ‘business’.

And it became clear to me, the real money is in running a business.  And by owning a profitable business, you create your own residual income – and – you own an asset that can be sold for a large amount.  This is the best of both worlds.

However, being able to start, run, and build a successful business is not something you’re born with.  Some people take to it much easier than others – perhaps they come from an entrepreneurial family and that’s really rubbed off, or some people are just entrepreneurial by nature.

It took me a loooong time to really start understanding internet marketing, money management, website publishing, advertising, sales… and everything else you need to know to run a successful business.  It took tons of studying and trial and error in the evenings (after my day job), and then really kicked in once I’d gone full time in my business and was living off savings, so I had to make it work.

The point I’m getting at is if you want big money – as residual income, and with the option of a huge pay day when you sell your business, then being in business for yourself is the way to go.

That said, many people earn a great extra income with very little day to day work with a part time business in the evenings – some a few dollars a month, some a few hundred dollars a month, and some a few thousand dollars a month.

All the sacrifices it takes to really build a business is not for everyone since it’s risky and takes over your life.  But once you’ve built your business and pushed the boulder to the top of the hill, your business continues to grow and make money for you with much less effort (the boulder starts rolling down the other side…)

But again, I would say maybe most people are happy with a few hundred (or more) dollars extra a month with a business they can fit in around their schedule.  And I specifically offer Gold Membership to the site to help you achieve this goal, and in a way that short cuts by years the development of a profitable business.

Okay, I’ve moved slightly off topic — why am I so against network marketing?

Here’s why:

• You don’t have flexibility of what you sell.  You need to sell/promote the products of the company, and these are often way overpriced.  Saying that, I was a customer of USANA for a long time since I found their product good but it really is way overpriced and I’ve since stopped taking it.  There’s no way you could get away with charging those prices at retail.
• It’s a flimsy business model – the bulk of your money is made on finding others who want to be in business, and their goal is to find others… you end up with thousands of people not doing anything, at best they continue to buy the products.
• If the company goes under, you get no more income.  Would you really invest thousands of dollars and years of your life, into an income stream that could disappear overnight?  I knew a very motivated network marketer who was making around $400,000 a year from a company he’d been promoting very hard for years.  All the investment and hard work had paid off and this money kept coming in… until the company went bankrupt and his income dropped to zero.

Look, this is all my opinion, but I started out in network marketing, but realized that it’s selling a dream that isn’t even close to reality.  The story you hear of the first Amway guy to start recruiting in China (may have the facts wrong here, but you get the idea) may be true, but how many people like that are there in the world – a few dozen?  And again, you’re selling overpriced products that people don’t really want, and staking your entire livelihood on a company that could go out of business overnight.

Again – for the real long term income plus a huge pay day in the future, I strongly recommend building your own profitable business that you can sell one day.  This isn’t for everyone, but if you feel it’s for you and you’re confident you’ll reach your business goals, the upside is huge for you.

But once more – you don’t need to take things to that level to make $500 or $5,000 extra a month part time.  Having your own business you run evenings and weekends can be an easy way to make extra cash, and if you’re building websites and marketing them, you’re creating assets you can sell down the road.

For example – I sold several sites to a business partner of mine recently.  They weren’t making much money at all since I’d neglected them (I have trouble multi-tasking), but they were getting around 300 visitors a day total (across all the sites) consistently, at no cost.  So my business partner purchased the sites from me for a very nice five figure sum, so he could present offers to those visitors.

I’d done the work on those sites years ago, neglected them, but because I had built up valuable assets, I could sell them for a good amount.