There are a lot of shady things uplines may encourage their teams to do. Not all uplines or reps are malicious or dishonest, of course, but I want to highlight some of the sneaky tips that are shared in an effort to boost sales. Some people have absolutely no shame about using tragedies to market their stuff, trying to sell weight loss products to new moms, or being blatantly dishonest.
Be Vague
Since using your personal Facebook profile for commercial gain is against the terms of service, you aren't supposed to make it obvious that you're selling MLM stuff from your personal page. You're supposed to talk about "your business" and the "great opportunity" and products you have to offer, but not actually say what the company is or how much things cost. I've also seen advice against having the name of the company in your profile or cover photos since that might make people less likely to accept your friend request. (Hm, I wonder why that could be...)
When posting about a product, reps don't usually say the prices outright and instead will send you a private message about the details if you express an interest. It's easier to see someone advertising a $39 foundation, realize that's way too much money, and keep scrolling than it is to see a post about foundation, comment to ask how much it is, and then have to tell your friend you don't want to pay $39 after they reveal how much it is in a one-on-one conversation. That's one of the top pieces of advice given out by uplines.
Get Engagement, Give Engagement
The Facebook algorithm is an annoying creature, to say the least, but MLM reps will often try to use it to their advantage. If they get a lot of people to interact with one of their posts, their posts might show up in those people's feeds more often. If they interact with their friends' posts, that same thing may happen. (Unless the friend has FB Purity, which is one of my two favorite browser extensions!) That's why you'll sometimes see your MLM friends ask questions about what people love about certain seasons, what their plans are for a holiday weekend, what books to read, how many places they've visited, and other such things. They want people to share their opinions so that Facebook thinks they want to see more posts from them.
A recent example of this is the "#HocusPocus witch detector" stuff that lots of people were sharing and participating in. Supposedly, Facebook has a "witch detector" and could potentially show you as being a witch if you comment "#HocusPocus" on something. Most comments are just the hashtag, but some people would instead comment with an image that Facebook allegedly put on their comment because they're a witch, and thus made other people believe that it was actually working. Despite it being fairly easy to disprove, a lot of MLM sellers shared that copypasta anyway because it's a simple way to get a bunch of people commenting on your post, which then makes the Facebook algorithm think that you post things people are interested in.
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| An easy way to get a ton of comments on your post, even if those comments are meaningless. |
Brag
This comes in various degrees and flavors, but the main idea is to post about how great the products are, how the money you made helped you buy a certain thing, or some other benefit you've supposedly gotten from joining your company. People will make up stories about a stranger asking what product they're wearing or post a picture of their receipt from the grocery store and say it was all possible because of their "small business" sales. They may even share before-and-after pictures that may or may not be legitimate or of someone who actually used the product. (Some "before X supplement vs. after X supplement" pictures are stolen from people who lost weight in a legitimate way, sometimes it's pictures taken on the same day but with a different pose/pair of pants/lighting setup, and sometimes they're straight-up edited to look better. It's depressingly easy to find edited pictures posted by people in the makeup, skincare, and "health" MLMs.)
A lot of MLM people will make a big deal of how they're an entrepreneur #bossbabe and have their own small business. Those sound like cool accomplishments until you realize that all they did was sign up with an already existing company and start trying to sell the products that they have no control over. Actual small businesses make decisions about things like what products they sell, what manufacturer they use, and what prices they charge. MLM "businesses" come with sales requirements you have to meet in order to stay at a certain level/status or get "promoted" to a higher one (although it seems to me like if you were actually your own boss, there wouldn't be anyone higher up to promote you to mega-boss. You don't see people who own a bakery saying that now that they've reached 400 cupcake sales in a month, they're the Purple Diamond Crown owner of that bakery instead of just the Green Squire owner.)
If you join an MLM, you're actually a salesperson for a large company, and you're not even getting paid as much as a regular salesperson would be despite all the time, energy, and friendships your efforts have cost you. You're not a small business, so quit taking up space in craft bazaars and farmers' markets.
Something else reps brag about is when the company's products sell out. This is something that non-MLM brands do, too, but it makes me roll my eyes every time I see a rep talk about how this certain product sold out so quickly and that must mean it's simply amazing!! That's really not the case. Sometimes, brands do legitimately run out of product and can't meet the demand. A lot of the time, though, it's just a way for the brand to create hype through scarcity. (There's also the fact that reps for some companies are encouraged to buy stuff when it first launches so they can show it to potential customers, so most of the sales that caused the instant drain of stock came from people who are already selling the company's products, not excited customers.) Brands that do this will have an estimate of how many products they could probably sell, but then only stock or produce a part of that number, thus inciting a sense of desperation to get it next time it's available because you might be missing out on something great. It's a known tactic, much like the trend of limited edition items that will only be sold for a certain amount of time. If a brand manages to restock that coveted item fairly quickly, that might be a sign that they were simply holding back on selling as much as they could've, because actually creating more product usually takes time. Take the Holo Taco brand of nail polish, for example. A certain amount of polishes were made before the brand launched, the enthusiasm of customers was way underestimated, and the polishes were unavailable for quite a while because more polishes needed to be manufactured and there's also some sort of shortage of the flakie glitters that one of the top coats uses. Another example is Sugarpill Cosmetics, who sold out of their adorable Fun Size palette at the end of September and have said they won't be able to restock it until December. There are some brands (like ColourPop) who do have the ability to restock and produce new products quite quickly, but they're in the minority.
Seem Exclusive
This is sort of a combination of being vague and bragging. Reps will say that they have a limited number of spots available on their team, that they have an opportunity that will only last for a certain amount of time, or otherwise make it seem like you can only join their company if you act quickly. This is a blatant lie. There isn't a limit to the number of people you're allowed to recruit under you and there aren't certain windows in which recruiting is forbidden. They're simply hoping that this tactic might pressure you into joining before you think about it too much for fear of missing out.
Pity Purchases and Inducing Guilt
If you think about it, the sales reps are the real customers in an MLM, but they'll occasionally get someone outside the company to buy products from them. Some people will buy something small just to get the person to leave them alone or because they want to be supportive of their friend's "small business." It's kind of like when a couple of Girl Scouts confront you outside of Walmart and ask you to buy their cookies, except those cookies are something most people actually enjoy, the money goes to a decent cause, and the price is pretty reasonable. Even if you don't particularly want the cookies, part of you wants to buy some anyway because the sweet little girls want you to. What Girl Scouts don't usually do, however, is try to make you feel bad about buying Oreos instead of their cookies. I've seen people post angrily about their friends shopping at Ulta and refusing to buy their $29 mascara, even sometimes implying that they should've just paid the higher price (for a lesser product) because little Tymotheigh needs new soccer shoes or something. If you tell an MLM person that you don't want to buy their stuff because you don't support MLMs, they may reply with something snarky like, "Oh, so you don't like supporting women who are building their empires from home?!" Ugh.
It's not my responsibility to help you pay for stuff; everyone has their own bills and expenses to deal with. I've bought baked goods from local teenagers raising money for things, bought handmade items from Etsy shops, shopped at the local bookstore, and commissioned some art from an awesome friend recently, but I never felt any sort of pressure or guilt from them. I have no problem with supporting legitimate small businesses unless they try to make me feel like a jerk for also buying stuff from Walmart and Amazon.
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| ...because those are pyramid schemes? Is that an acceptable answer? Also, "Don't think, just do it!" is a terrible philosophy to have when it comes to buying something. |
People just love to make their kid pose for a picture that they can use for their MLM sales. Or, if the kid doesn't want to be in a picture, they might make up a story about what the kid supposedly said or did that proves how much they like the products. This seems to come up a lot in the essential oil companies. "LaKynn wasn't feeling very good today, poor baby! She asked mama for the I-Can't-Legally-Say-This-Cures-Anything-But-Who-Knows-Maybe-It-Cures-Cancer oil blend and perked right up! #OilyLife #WhoNeedsVaccinesWhenYouHaveOils"
Reps have also been known to have their husbands model their unsold LuLaRoe inventory (because LLR sizing is meaningless and any dress picked at random has a good chance of being able to fit Hagrid) or subject them to a makeover. Whatever gets the likes, I guess.
Groups, Parties, and Contact Info
This is some of the most obnoxious stuff that MLM reps do, in my opinion. If you've never experienced it, consider yourself very lucky. Since it's against the rules to use your personal Facebook profile for commercial gain, most MLM people will have either a business page or a group. The thing about Facebook groups is that people can add you into them without you agreeing to it. Thankfully, you can leave the group and check a box that prevents people from re-adding you, but it's still supremely annoying to find yourself suddenly in a "Color Street by Nevaeh" group and have to frantically get yourself out of it before anyone messages you about nail products. Reps will sometimes have giveaways or discounts for people who add a certain number of their friends to the group.
A very popular strategy among MLMs is to have a non-seller friend host a "party" and invite their friends to buy stuff from there. If it's a physical party at someone's house, there's the awkwardness of not wanting to purchase anything but feeling the pressure from the person standing right in front of you holding out a catalog. If it's a Facebook event calling itself a party, the only thing that really happens is the host makes a lot of posts about how great the products are, the seller tries to incentivize people to buy things by having a giveaway for a random buyer or saying each purchase earns the host a certain amount of product, and nobody else really posts much of anything. Neither kind of party results in any fun whatsoever.
Mary Kay is especially bad about getting people's phone numbers without their permission and hounding them about things. They've been known to get contact information from places like David's Bridal so they can offer "pampering sessions" to people, claiming they're the lucky winner of a giveaway they never entered. Those turn out to be a sales pitch in disguise and Mary Kay reps aren't supposed to apply the products to your face so you have to do it yourself if you do accept. Sometimes they'll ask their friends/customers to write down the phone numbers of people they know who might be interested in Mary Kay, which seems like a great way to get back at somebody you hate.
Include Empty Packaging In Pictures
To make it seem like lots of people are placing orders, some MLM reps will take a product out of its box and then have both the empty box and the product itself visible in the picture they post about the order that just arrived.
Message Anyone and Everyone
If sales aren't pouring in like they were supposed to, reps might simply go down their friend list and try every person who could possibly want to buy their stuff. If that doesn't work, they might get desperate enough to start messaging complete strangers. These messages are never particularly fun to get, but it's especially awful when they're promoting weight loss products. (Pro tip: If you want someone to potentially buy your stuff, maybe don't insult them by directly asking them if they want to buy your weight loss snake oil.)
I actually got a message request from a stranger a few months ago. She wanted to sell me Younique's latest mascara (which is probably a replacement for the infamous 3D fiber mascara that has recently been the subject of a lawsuit).
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| Why Is Everything Capitalized?! Also, most mascaras are only one step. |
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| In typical Lizzie fashion, I responded to her with way more text than she was probably expecting. She never wrote back. I'm guessing she stopped reading after "I would not." :/ I tried. |
Be Shameless
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, some MLM representatives seem to throw tact out the window in the name of sales. I've seen people try to use natural disasters or things like the anniversary of 9/11 to promote their products. Some people will use the sickness or death of a loved one to guilt people into buying their garbage. The MLMs that are focused on health and/or weight loss seem to be especially awful about this, with their reps directly asking people if they want an easy way to lose weight, which is ridiculously rude. People have been messaged days after having a baby by someone who supposedly wants to help them lose that baby weight and be beautiful again. Just... yuck! I generally try not to fault MLM reps for trying to succeed, but if you're willing to be so distasteful and insulting as to push your products at super insensitive times, you need to take a step back and think about how low you've stooped.
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| Hurricane causing destruction and killing people? Seems like a good time to sell nail stuff. |
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| Everyone grieves in different ways, but I don't think shilling skincare is a very common way to cope with the loss of a parent. |
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| I'd much rather send the money I would spend on your overpriced R+F skincare directly to hurricane relief. That way, I contribute a little to the cause and no R+F products have to touch my face. A win-win situation. |
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| "Congratulations on successfully pushing a baby out of your body! Anyway, since that whole pregnancy thing made you fat, want to start selling weight loss supplements?" |
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| Have you lost a loved one recently? Here, buy this wax warmer that looks like someone cleaned an old can of corn, punched some hearts out of the sides, and glued some wings onto it. I'm sure that will make things better. |
I don't know about you, but I'm feeling mildly infuriated right now. This seems like a good place to end today's post. Look forward to part three, in which I'll share examples of specific products from a lot of these companies and essentially roast them. That one will be a lot more fun to write.
Love,
Lizzie
Lizzie
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