Empower Network decline taking its toll?
Empower Network launched on the simple idea that people would pay the affiliate who recruited them $25 a month for WordPress. Once they had their foot in the door and realised WordPress was free and not owned by Empower Network, they’d then be told to “go all in” and purchase further “training”.
Once they’d paid their thousands of dollars, they were then qualified to receive commissions by going out and telling others the same. For each person they convinced to sign up and go through the process as they themselves had done, commissions were paid.
The central problem and give-away that affiliates were simply just paying eachother based on recruitment was that Empower Network didn’t own the rights to WordPress.
WordPress is
a free and open source blogging tool and a content management system (CMS) based on PHP and MySQL, which runs on a web hosting service.
WordPress is used by more than 18.9% of the top 10 million websites as of August 2013.
WordPress is the most popular blogging system in use on the Web, at more than 60 million websites.
After it became too much to continue the facade of pretending they were selling access to WordPress for $25 a month, with the goal of eventually convincing people to pass up thousands of dollars to their affiliate uplines, Empower Network paid someone to develop their own blogging platform.
ENV2 was released in October 2013 and, despite the “WordPress-killer” marketing hype, all it did was further reduce the blogging functionality of what was already a paper-thin facade to begin with.
I suspect the handful of people who were actually paying their upline on the belief that the Empower Network domain held some SEO value, up and left.
This didn’t go unnoticed at the top and has resulted in a shift away from a focus on “just blog and earn infinity money” to tin-can style internet marketing courses.
By and large these latest attempts to convince people to continue to hand over money to their uplines each month (passed all the way up to the top, where Empower Network owners David Wood and David Sharpe sit), target traffic and lead generation.
The problem with Empower Network traffic generation is that you’re directing traffic to something that’s not as attractive to the type of people who might be convinced to part with $25 for access to WordPress and then thousands of dollars in upsells later on.
ENV2 is a flop, and no amount of hype is going to convince the world that it’s even a remote competitor to WordPress.
Case in point?
David Wood’s own personal blog site?
WordPress.
David Sharpe?
WordPress too.
Wood and Sharpe are the most obvious examples of ENV2’s lack of viability, but look up any other Empower Network top-affiliate and you’ll find the same thing. Yeah they might have an Empower Network blog counter-part but their primary blog, the one they actually give a crap about and brand themselves on?
WordPress.
With it being harder to convince people to dip their toes into Empower Network’s ENV2 for $25, focus has now shifted to extracting as much money as possible from those who have already bought in.
For this Empower Network has tapped into its top affiliates, most of whom have extensive internet marketing backgrounds. David Wood’s latest strategy is a weekly leaderboard, which assigns points to affiliates each time they complete varying tasks. Typically these tasks involve selling Empower Network training courses, recruiting affiliates as customers and buying Empower Network event tickets.
Problem is you’re still throwing traffic and leads at a baseline blogging platform nobody cares or is passionate about.
And yeah, the days of people blindly throwing thousands of dollars on the promise of being able to receive their “all in” deposit back by recruiting others who do the same are long gone.
Looking at the bigger picture, the obvious point to make here is that none of this is even remotely sustainable.
This is evidenced by Alexa’s traffic statistics for the Empower Network domain:
What you’re looking at there is the slow realization of people at the bottom of the pass-up scheme, realizing they’re obviously not going to get their money back.
I will note however that Empower Network’s ranking number is of course nothing to be ashamed about, being in the top 1000 is a remarkable effort (despite how they got there) and my intention is not to rubbish that accomplishment.
What I will say though is that in the top 1000 websites, when we talks swings of 100 places or even 50 (or less), that translates into thousands, if not tens of thousands of pageviews. In the upper ranks we’re talking hundreds of thousands (millions higher still).
And while the decline thus far hasn’t largely seemed to affect those collecting regular payments from their downlines (at least not publicly), there are a few examples of things coming undone.
The most recent example comes from the top of the Empower Network pass-up pile. David Sharpe recently announced to the world he has Hepatitis-C. He’s known about it for a while but is only now going to seek treatment.
I certainly don’t hold a disease against the man (however he contracted it) and I wish Sharpe the fastest of recoveries.
What Sharpe’s announcement does mean in the context of this article is that he’s obviously out of the picture until his health is back ont rack. That leaves David Wood running a one-man show.
What exactly Empower Network’s newly appointed CEO actually does has yet to manifest itself. Footrubs? Coffee runs? Who knows…
As it stands, Wood’s primary income relies on a constant source of new money flowing in at the bottom of Empower Network. This keeps his top-affiliates happy and if they’re happy they keep passing up one in every five payments to him (it’s not as simple of that as everyone is passing up one in five, but that’s the gist of it).
Lower participation means less money at the bottom being passed up, which means unhappy affiliates. And everytime that happens, Wood publishes a rant or makes a video about it.
Just last month Wood ordered affiliates to go out and recruit at least two affiliates (“customers”) a day.
What I’ve observed (and I can’t be the only one), is that Wood’s rants are containing increasing markers of frustration. Such to the point that they now entirely hollow.
Don’t take my word for it though, read Wood’s words for yourself. This is his latest rant (sans waffle), published earlier today:
What’s my vision?
To create the richest possible team.
The RICHEST possible TEAM. NOT the richest possible ‘ME’.
I’m not here to ‘get rich’ – because…
…if I want to get rich, there’s a lot of things I could do with my life, that I don’t want to do. Including this —
Because I was making money before Empower Network, LLC.
Before Empower Network – I had my first $10,000 month.
Before Empower Network, I had my first $20,000 month.
Before Empower Network – I had my first $100,000 month.
I don’t need Empower Network to make money. Because if Empower Network didn’t exist – I would make money without it.
Because I can sell shit. I can sell shit DAMNED GOOD.
Occasionally – some idiot (I emphasize ‘IDIOT’ — and would like to add the language of ‘big wussy, that I’d like to punch in the face’ — to emphasize the patheticness of being a critical idiot). Anyways… some idiot thinks I’m doing this for MONEY. Because I NEED to GET RICH.
FACT:
Dear IDIOT:
I don’t need Empower Network to make money. Because I make money selling shit.
And – “dear idiot” if you don’t join my business — I don’t give a shit. Because I don’t need idiots in my life, or sales from ‘morons’ like you to make money.
Because I understand WHY people by shit. AND it isn’t because they are idiots, like you are. People buy shit because they are SMART and want the BEST that life has to offer.
Can you BUY my position and my AUTHORITY in Empower Network?
NO. Because…you CAN’T BUY ME!!!!
Because I am: “Un-fucking buy-able”. It doesn’t matter if you give me a million dollars… or two. OR TEN.
Because when I was making only $30,000 a month (before Empower Network) — I was offered $1.7 million to join a nutritional deal.
And I said: “NO!!!!”
Because: I am NOT a sell out!
(fuck you idiots – that think I am doing this for money. You broke, poor, morons. If I see you – swing at my face. Because I would love to break you NOSE in the name of greatness.
And if you accidentally injure me in the name of FREEDOM – I can die in peace – knowing that I sacrifice my life to give to the cause of GREATNESS. And I’ll break your nose back in the process — and I’ll celebrate your broken nose… with photos on my Facebook Timeline. Thanks for being a moron.)
I do NOT do what I do for money – I DON’T need Empower Network for that.
I need ‘ME’ for that.
I need ‘Dave Wood working his ass of “giving value” for that’.
I NEED the ‘David Wood’ that has been forged in the fires of ‘Hard Work’ and ‘hypnotic, badass fucking salesmanship’.
And the ‘ME’ (Dave Wood) is forged from DAILY personal development – that has been going on ‘DAILY’ for more than 13 years (since 2002).
So those who think this is a ‘LOTTERY’ or that I preach that — go fuck yourself. Because you are a moron. And if you want – I will GLADLY punch you in the face in front of 5,000 people…
The question is:
Are you going to be full of shit — and make EXCUSES to why you can or can’t do this — or NOT?
Click ‘LIKE’ and ‘SHARE’ — and let’s stop being a God Damned wussy.
AND — are you here for a free lunch?
I punch wussies in the face — but I don’t want to punch you in the face.
WHY?
BECAUSE life punches wussies in the face.
Are you willing to work for your dreams or not? Are you willing to take CRITICISM or not? Are you willing to STAND STRONG or not?
Then click the button — and god damned join.
JOIN NOW. That’s it, period.
Because I’m sick of the bullshit. Let’s lock arms — and fight the forces of evil.
YOU DOWN? Let’s rock.
IF NOT — I’d like to emphasize… Be an idiot, and be poor. Because… I’m cool with that.
Love ya,
David Wood
Ah the internet, where lanky pasty-faced internet marketers can re-invent themselves as rogue trash-talking gangsters.
It was extremely tempting to dedicate the next few paragraphs to ridiculing Wood’s threats to punch people in the face and break their noses infront of the Empower Network affiliate collective, but I won’t. Wood’s words speak for themselves. Me poking any further fun at them just seems cruel.
Note that even with my editing there’s still a considerable amount of waffle in Wood’s theatrics, but the core message behind the rant is still obvious enough: “Join Empower Network”.
And by that of course Wood means hand over money to an Empower Network affiliate, who does the same, who does the same… and Wood gets paid. Same old schtick, only now Wood’s mixing larger doses of his personality into the mix.
And what a personality it is!
Beyond Wood’s inner-circle of “yes men”, I’m not really sure who this sort of communication style is supposed to appeal to. Even if wasn’t aware of the mechanics of Empower Network’s compensation plan, Wood’s proclamation of self-awesomeness is still painfully embarrassing to read through.
Looking to the future, apparently there’s some Empower Network event coming up and then… well there doesn’t seem to be any public game-plan going forward. And if I’m feeling the state of directionless looking in, I can only wonder what it’s like to be in the thick of it.
The bottom-line appears to be rooted in people not being able to market ENV2 because it’s a poor man’s WordPress (that costs more), but apparently that’s being addressed by just having existing affiliates pay more for marketing training.
I certainly wouldn’t expect a state of constant growth within the company but a steady decline over a six month period that is likely to only get worse should be addressed. At the very least there should be some form of retention beyond those at the top trying to get shiny gold rings.
The question that needs to be asked: Where to from here?
Very well written and accurately documented.
Thank you.. instead of just rolling your eyes this needs to be exposed for what it is until its been put to an end. It is very detrimental to peoples lives in more ways than one.
When I finally realized the truth underneath its save the world message I began to question the functionality, technical issues and the hidden truths. I was accused of being negative and a gossiper.
The fact that Dave refused to address the issues I brought up said a lot. His anger and vehemence for the ones who believed so very much in him that we gave all our time and money to find out there are lies LOTS of endless lies..shows how heartless he is.
If his mind is not on money why does he continue? Pride, power, anger…insanity 🙁 in theory it could have functioned effectively but his ego drove the ship to hell.
Standard tin-can response for MLM marketers who simply disagree with what is being said because it doesn’t fit their mindset, irrespective of the merit and/or legitimacy of what is being said.
Sad thing is, it’s taught at the top. Much easier to manipulate people if mold them to listen to nobody but you.
Personally I find it amusing it’s gone from “I was homeless in a van but now I make a bajillion dollars, so can you!” to “I was making 100,000 a month before EN, I don’t need this shit”.
All that talk of hypnotic and persuasive marketing? Well here it is. Much easier to get people to hand money over to their sponsor (some of which is handed over to you) if you can convince them you’re Mother Teresa.
13 years of DAILY personal development? 🙂
Most people will manage to get relatively “developed” in much shorter time than that? 🙂
Wow. Great post. Sounds like Mr. Wood is becoming increasingly frustrated with his empower network.
The funny thing, is that his hypnotized followers will probably embrace his new hardcore gangster tone.
I think his post just goes to show who he really is. He definitely has a unique tactic for ‘personal development’. I didn’t know that calling less fortunate people idiots was in the Tony Robbins handbook.
@OZ
Regarding David Wood and his homeless claim before EN I noticed the same thing in his writing. He essentially has declared that all to be a lie (not that I believed it before). Not too smart since that was his lead “story.” His writing was very disjointed.
It truly sounds like it is coming from someone who is either under a lot of pressure or under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Or, maybe it is a calculated move to create a false enemy and us against the world mentality among a group of people looking for an identity regardless of the cost.
Take your pick, it sounds like the wheels are coming off.
A coercive narrative designed to persuade / sell need not be based on the truth.
Speaking of which, Dan Ariely, a famous psychologist, is doing a free Duke Uni / Coursera course starting this coming week, free on Coursera.org, on behavior ecnomics (why we succumb to scams and hard sell)
He’s under the influence of selfdev training, e.g. self suggestion, self hypnosis, affirmations, visualization, motivational recordings including “sleep-tapes”, maybe some physical techniques. In short, “program your own mind to become successful” methods.
I have recognized some methods from the 1980-ies or earlier.
A story about “homeless and broke, lived in a van” isn’t a lie from that point of view. It’s simply about “adding color to the story”.
A story about “I was offered $1.7 million to join a nutritional deal” can be about the same, but it’s more likely about a selfdev method …
“If you want to change your future, you must change your current actions and mindset. If you want to change your current actions and mindset, you must first change how you SEE your past, by replacing those images and feelings that currently are holding you prisoned”.
I didn’t repeat that correctly, I only tried to give an example for the TYPE of selfdev idea. Some “program your own mind to become successful” ideas are about replacing memories with new images, e.g. people can replace the memory of a failure with a modified story where they handled the situation. It works in theory, but it doesn’t work very well in reality.
No amount of selfdev or silly Facebook posts can cover the fact that EN has zero retail viability and hasn’t since they ditched WordPress. That bottom rung money being passed up has to dwindle to breaking point sooner or later.
I think the David Wood marketing approach has really come down to attracting only those who feel they need to sign up if they’re called names. That on its own isn’t going to last in the long-term.
Why would anyone in their right mind want to sign up any “customers” if these customers might risk hearing these type of insane rants.
Perhaps this is all an escape plan!
It reminds me of an old Seinfeld episode where George tells Jerry, “It’s not a lie if you believe it’s true.”
It occurs to me that this might be brilliant. After all, who amongst us but the most gullible would actually respond and invest our time and money into a company promoted with such language and vulgarity? Low hanging fruit, that’s who.
This guy is making a cash-grab and will disappear soon enough. Shame that he might get away with it though. Just my opinion.
Sounds like it might be interesting.
Here is the most important line of his whole rant: ‘hypnotic, badass fucking salesmanship’. This is exactly what he uses to take peoples money.
I am snapping my fingers and more and more are waking up. Thank you Oz for doing the same.
WOW. Over here in the US David Wood and his lack of professionalism would be termed “Trailer Trash”.
My prediction from day one for the longevity of Empower was 34 months. This has become a pretty fun game for me. I am usually within 6 months, every time. Next I am going to start picking exact dates.
I dont think it serves me well to swim around in the toilet like that, because its a little unprofessional ha ha. But I dont claim to be perfect. Perhaps when I start calling myself a “Guru” I will need to stop. 🙂
The emperor wears no clothes…
David Sharpe has set his FP so the general public can no longer read it unless they follow him.
David Wood is pimping Vick Strizheus’ program like there’s no tomorrow.
There is no mention on Wood’s, Rush’s nor EN’s FB about the Seattle event that starts next week which I thought was very odd. I saw mention of a previous event elsewhere and so did a web search to see when the next one was coming up which is how I found that it was next week.
I also found a review of their last one in Denver which supposedly only had a little over 2,000 people despite them claiming they were expecting 6,000.
While EN might be around this time next year, it will be pretty much only in name only. I suspect the heavy hitters will be dropping out this year and moving on.
Hold up, Sharpe’s FB is just inactive, he hasn’t set it to private (I think?).
I’m not intimately familiar with Facebook but I believe he just hasn’t updated the profile in a while, so the last post has dropped into the “older entries” section at the bottom of the page. It’s still accessible if you click the button.
I believe the marketing campaign for this Seattle event is to get people to take out their credit cards and laugh until they convince themselves to spend thousands of dollars (go all in).
The thrust seems to be Wood attempting to get prospects to associate spending money in Empower Network with something positive (laughter). Personally I feel it’s crossing a line in the manipulative marketing arena.
You are correct. I just saw a bunch of blank space and didn’t see the older posts link at the bottom.
I trust all of your post but I must say:
I’ve been with EN for a little while and have made some good money with them.. I think the most I get from them is education on how to market online.
Most of my training comes from other leaders involved in EN. I know have of those leaders wouldn’t be in my life if it wasn’t for EN. As for the blog, yes I do think its ok at best. Investing in your own blog make more sense.
Most of the training, I could’ve found it any where online but the value that I get with the relationship of other team members is priceless. So to criticize the company means and methods, I really dont. You have to take the value from the teachings and run with it. You can win in any MLM, its all based on what you know to make it successful.
That’s the bottom line. The value you get from participants is neither here nor there. The ones at the top are only there to collect the passups they get each month.
Nobody will dispute any perceived value outside of the compensation plan, it’s the plan that is the problem.
You joined Empower Network and gifted money to the person who recruited you. You then recruited others who gifted you.
EN’s products aren’t actually bought or sold, because all of the money “paid” for them it’s paid to recruiting affiliates. The retail customer base is negiligble, if not entirely non-existent (they count expired affiliates and those who haven’t recruited as retail customers, which is a fallacy).
Your analysis completely ignored the gifting business model, which is the core of the problem (not whether you learnt anything or not).
David Sharpe steps down as co-founder of EN due to health reasons:
badasscontent.com/personal-message-from-dave2
Not entirely sure what to make of that. He’s genuinely sick but it does appear to be convenient. Co-founder stepping down seems to fit the general state of decay over there.
I think Sharpe put a fair amount of work into the failed Blog Beast platform too, so that no doubt contributed to the decision.
Basically EN is currently a rudderless ship. No product, a fairly large’ish userbase remains and there’s no core product or service that’s viable. I think they’ll just continue to try to pitch random marketing offers to whoever’s left and that’ll be the end of it eventually.
I actually thought EN would go under through an eventual SEC investigation into selling something they don’t own and using the familiar model of paying old investors with new investors money but given the way David has handled this it now seems EN is going to just sink on its own lol.
Good and Bad in a way because there is one guy i really despise aside from the 2 davids in EN and thats the blatant lying scumbag that is Vick Strizheus. And being the top affiliate through plain deception, its clear what his next move will be.
Make another poorly designed site that offers unfinished training on how to pay for traffic whilst changing the signup link for his affiliates to his own whilst they do all the work for him (remember his last trick with the 10k challenge just before xmas last year?).
That stunt made him $710,000 in 28 days.
I actually made a facebook page to educate people on his tactics but i’m not sure if Oz would allow me to post that link so i’ll wait for permission as i know the majority of posters in here are very well educated 🙂
Although potentially interesting, sounds like it’s more an expose into Stizheus’ marketing than an MLM opportunity. That’s beyond the scope of the information featured here.
I happened across this post and this is an interesting conversation, but one of the problems is I’m reading a lot of statements being made as fact without any corroboration or explanation as to how the information was obtained.
A lot of people are saying “they calculate commissions like this…” or “…they count inactive affiliates as customers…” etc. without any explanation as to how they have obtained the information.
Full disclosure; I’m an EN affiliate and have made damn good money, more money faster than I ever have in any biz venture.
As for David Wood’s communication style, believe me there are plenty of people, myself included, who find it a breath of fresh air.
I think all of the products are extremely valuable if you know what you’re actually looking at, particularly the 15K Formula.
I am always interested though at the unbelievable amount of energy people will expend simply to criticize, denigrate or try to bring down other people’s efforts as opposed to simply creating something better themselves.
Since David Wood and Empower Network are being cast as such pieces of shit, has anyone in this comments section done better or created a better company, biz venture, etc? Let me know.
Try the Empower Network compensation plan.
This has been covered previously on BehindMLM. It’s from EN’s income disclosure.
Of course you are.
They always are…
So how many non-affiliates, people who have never signed up as an affiliate, have you sold the “extremely valuable products” to?
How many affiliates have you had gift you payments for said products, just so they can then qualify for gifting payments from people they recruit?
I had a chicken burger for dinner last night.
First and last warning, derail attempts will be marked as spam.
This was sent in by a reader:
Published on August 20th, if the grapevine is to be believed Tony Rush is jumping ship to Dubli.
You know the deal, secret incentives and backroom closed-door negotiations.
He claims to be the top earner in EN so he’s not abandoning the gifting pass-ups, but we all know you can’t focus on two businesses full-time.
I don’t have time to do a writeup so I’m posting this as a comment. I’ve saved it as a bookmark for a future article though.
I wonder what the cult of Wood will make of it…
The only thing surprising about this is that it took him this long to do it. EN has been in a death spiral since Sharpe left (probably before).
While I have no doubt he’ll make a good run of whatever this company is, I have to wonder if this will be his third strike when it eventually fails.
LLI caused a lot of financial hurt for people and EN’s income disclaimer states that only 4% of affiliates make enough to cover the costs of their EN products which means, over 96% of people are losing/have lost money if you add in non-EN product costs. (I’m not counting the coin company since he was in it for such a short time).
How many times can he get away with causing financial distress to thousands of people before people wake up and say enough is enough?
Very interesting news! I just heard earlier today that John Lavenia, Tony’s running buddy in LLI and EN is now at the ‘new all improved’ Dubli… so not too surprising news that Tony would be there too! Will be interested to hear, Oz, your take on the ‘new’ Dubli!
Dubli doesn’t exactly match his background experience, unless Dubli has dramatically changed just recently.
Background:
Polaris Global Media (Liberty League International), seminars
Numis Network (I’m not sure about that one?)
WMI Wealth Masters International, seminars
Empower Network, blog / seminars
Dubli:
When people were jumping ship from PGM in early 2010, Dubli was mentioned as the hottest destination, but very few actually joined it. Dubli didn’t have the right appeal back then, so I seriously doubt it has that appeal now.
When LLI/PGM collapsed in the Australian market around September 2009 – February 2010, some people started new companies, some probably joined other seminar based opportunities, a few may have joined Dubli.
Seminars and coaching:
His most significant background experiences are about seminar based opportunities, sales and marketing coaching, personal development (speaker at events, e.g. some “Summit” event in May 2013, with the Rippln people among others).
The “high ticket seminar market” is probably dead. It reached its peaks in 2005 and 2009, and partly died shortly after (it recovered the first time). The “low entry cost / medium priced seminar market” is probably still alive.
“The writing on the wall”
Empower Network have probably started to slow down long time ago, “the writing is on the wall”. He was probably offered some type of “position” there when he joined.
I’m pretty sure he has been offered some type of “position” now too, not from an old opportunity like Dubli but from a relatively new one. Old opportunities already HAVE “leaders” filling up all positions, they have no positions to offer him.
If you want to attract experienced people, offer them that they can use their own experience and knowledge, “if it worked in your previous job then it will work for us to”.
If you offer them the wrong type of incentives, experienced people will usually negotiate a better deal or decline the offer completely.
Don’t know who these two are- Sam Crowley and Kristian Hoenicke- but here’s a Google hangout they just did on Dubli: saturday.leadpages.net/dnreplay/…
Here they go again with big ticket- $12,000 is top buy-in. dublinetwork.com/en/Register.aspx
I have heard from two very good sources that some of the top EN guys think EN has a life expectancy of less than a year…
@Pat
How many times have these guys re-invented themselves?
Years ago I wrote some articles on their auctions that went nowhere. Then they were some e-commerce outfit that didn’t look very MLM (I didn’t look very closely at them). Now I assume it’s something slightly different…
I’ll mark Dubli for review but won’t be able to look at it till I’m back in action.
There’s a note on Rod Cook’s MLM Watchdog that owner of Dubli bailed out a “known scammer” with last name of “Reed”. The logical conclusion is Reed had been working Dubli hard and the owner can’t lose this top guy to jail.
http://prosites-watchdog3.homestead.com/Buck_Reed_Bill_Gould.html
To them, this is no different than customizing one’s CV/resume for another job.
Several times. Each time somebody have brought up Dubli (not very often), they’re about to launch something or have just launched something. But it’s still the same old idea about “the next big thing on the internet” and investors.
“Dubli” is a tainted name in MLM and network marketing. Troy Dooly had something positive to say about it in 2012, but that was because he tried to compare ZeekRewards to something, and Dubli’s “reverse auction / unique bid auction” was probably the closest he could find.
The only positive he managed to come up with was “going public” and “online shopping mall”. I’m pretty sure he had suggested a similar solution for ZeekRewards.
The Tony Rush video:
He specifically say “brand new business opportunity” and “brand new organization”. That doesn’t sound like Dubli. Dubli CAN of course be an organizer for something, but Dubli itself doesn’t have the right type of “profile” as a “brand new opportunity”.
He’s mentioning another video too, a secret one. The first video is simply an introduction to the second one, “the video you’re about to see” contained in the same e-mail.
IDEAS vs “opportunities”
People join IDEAS, they don’t join “opportunities”. They join IDEAS they believe in themselves. The “opportunities” are simply a TYPE of idea, the type they’re currently looking at (or constantly are looking for, for some people).
Experienced people will join opportunities OTHERS can be attracted to (if the opportunity is recruitment driven). The more inexperienced ones will join opportunities they feel attracted to themselves, they often fail to look at what others may be attracted to.
Note that “people join IDEAS” wasn’t about WHAT people do, but about WHY they do something and how that process actually work.
I have watched a few of Tony Rush’ marketing videos. I used them as comparison to several others’ when I tried to look at the RESULTS of Empower Network’s marketing training. The results I looked for didn’t exist, but that’s a different story.
He’s not directly attracted to Empower Network’s IDEAS, i.e. he’s trying to sell them but he’s not using them himself (e.g. he’s not REPEATING something a mentor has told him to do, or REPEATING something from EN’s material). He’s probably repeating his OWN ideas.
I believe we can rule out that he will be looking for a “copy” of EN. His ideas simply doesn’t revolve around EN as “his favorite opportunity” (because he then would have “adopted” more of the ideas there himself). People will often look for copies of something that has worked for them personally, “their favorite opportunity”.
If I had been in a similar situation, I would have looked for “long term potential” rather than for “explosive growth potential” = something people can be interested enough in to be willing to pay a low monthly membership fee even if they don’t earn anything (something where people feel the service itself has a value). I prefer to have a relatively stable income (I’m not attracted to “huge success” short term).
“The other story”
I mentioned vaguly that I had watched some of his marketing videos when I tried to check the RESULTS of EN’s marketing training. “The results I looked for didn’t exist, but that’s a different story”.
The results I looked for were something to indicate that EN’s training actually could be useful, e.g. that people got some improvements of their existing skills or had learned some new skills in EN.
It turns out that I probably used incorrect search strings. “Empower Network training” only brought up a very specific type of videos, from people talking about “8 vital steps to become successful”.
“Empower Network marketing training” brought up other types of search results, but very variable results.
It turns out that Empower Network is telling people WHAT to do (e.g. “blog daily”), and WHY they should do it (e.g. “to attract people to your blog, so you can sell something to them”). But they fail to tell people about HOW to do it.
EN doesn’t add any “deeper understanding skills” for that. It has SOME “deeper understanding”, e.g. some general theory in a few videos, but those videos are rare and difficult to find.
It can also be seen as “sales technique” used to create a “reverse funnel system”. That sales method doesn’t match the message in the video, the one he want people to believe in (the message about the “12-15 people he personally know, respect, like to work with”).
RFS is used in mass marketing of opportunities, you don’t use that method to communicate something to people you personally know and want to work with. You use it to attract a specific type of people, for the purpose of selling an income opportunity to them through an automated system.
The video is uploaded on Youtube (692 views so far), where he has more than 7,000 subscribers. It has a link to WorkWithTonyRush.com, which only contain the same description of the new opportunity that currently is a secret, plus a “Claim your position”.
As far as I can see, that’s some classical parts of a “Reverse Funnel System”. It will TEST how interested people are, only the most eager ones will follow the trail all the way to its final destination (which probably is a video, somewhere at the end of that trail).
RFS as a “filter”
The RFS will filter out SOME people first (people must subscribe to be informed about the video), then some others (people must watch the video), then some others (people must click on the link), then some others (people must click on the “Claim your position” button).
I stopped there. The trail will probably lead to filling in e-mail address (to filter out more people), then to one or two more filters before people can watch the video presentation.
I don’t believe that website contain any videos, it’s simply a capture page. The link to a video will probably be sent by e-mail, to verify that people have entered a valid e-mail address.
Opportunities CAN be sold that way. It will not attract the “generals” he claim it is intended for, it will mostly attract “wannabe generals” of a specific type (a specific type of people with specific ideas).
The most interested ones will simply get more eager by all the steps they will have to go through to watch a marketing video. “Secret video”, “a selected few” etc. are all parts of a RFS strategy. Rippln used some similar methods.
The method he’s using doesn’t reflect Dubli (unless Dubli has changed dramatically). He’s using the same ideas as PGM/LLI used, as WMI / CCPro used, the same ideas taught by some of the “internet marketing gurus”. Or actually, they don’t TEACH it, but they USE it themselves and create replicated systems they can sell.
WHOIS for workwithtonyrush.com
Expires On March 08, 2015
Registered On March 08, 2011
Updated On March 09, 2014
@m_Norway…
Exactly my thoughts on the matter. It’s manipulation for personal gain.
These type of recruiters already have their so called generals in position, the rest simply fill in spaces.
I prefer “judas goats”
My CONCLUSION for my 3 or 4 posts where I tried to analyse different aspects of the Tony Rush video is that the video itself is “sales technique”. It’s not what it pretends to be (whatever that was?).
* He’s NOT trying to attract “5 or 6 generals, from a group of 12-15 people”, that method is completely wrong for that purpose. He want some people to FEEL it that way, that they’re “one of a selected few”.
* It’s NOT “an accidentally leaked video”, it’s about quite ordinary mass marketing.
The TYPE of opportunity he’s pushing is probably about “internet marketing training”, “personal development seminars” or something similar, sold as “moduls” (a low cost entry product, a medium priced product, a high priced product), where people will need to buy the product themselves to get the right to earn commissions from it.
It may have been organized by David Wood / David Sharpe as a successor to Empower Network / a supplement to EN. It may also have been organized by others, there’s MANY organizers available in that market.
EN’s use of “No Wussies allowed” was a marketing mistake for long term operation. It had some short term effects, but ideas like that will be worn out. If you first have declared it, you can’t easily reverse it.
Nothing’s worse than being stuck with ideas from the past in a market that changes rapidly, where the market DEMAND new ideas on a regular basis.
The Badass idea can’t easily be replaced or reversed. It may prevent other ideas from being introduced. I asked some people specifically about whether or not Tony Rush had copied that particular idea when I looked at the results of EN’s training.
That’s why I mentioned Wood / Sharpe as potential organizers (hidden ones). They have tried to renew the program in 2013 by upgrading the blog platform, but it failed to attract people. Wood released a recruitment campaign in early 2014, but I don’t think that worked either. They’re about to run completely out of new ideas for EN.
I’m not sure that I’m right, but I tried to look at it from many different perspectives, e.g. “What does the video try to tell us?” and “Is that reflected if I look closer at it?”.
The Youtube released video indicated mass marketing techniques rather than “personal invitation to a selected few”. But he actively tried to make it look like a “personal invitation”, “recorded there and then”.
He doesn’t fit into all types of opportunities. Some opportunities revolve too strongly around other ideas than he’s using himself. I also looked at that, e.g. the type of experience he has and what he seems to prefer to sell.
One problem with my interpretation of the Tony Rush video:
He clearly say “It has never been done before” as a part of the “brand new organization, in a brand new opportunity” statement. I have only looked at known types of opportunities, the ones he has joined earlier and the ones where a “Reverse Funnel System” has been used earlier.
But “It has never been done before” can of course be about COMBINATIONS of well known ideas. It can also be about small details.
I’m not very interested in HIS opportunities, i.e. I’m not eager enough to follow the trail to its end (from initial video (currently 899 views) –> capture page (WorkWithTonyRush.com) –> autoresponder –> email with link to a new video –> the actual video presenting the new opportunity) –> various unknown steps.
Usually that video at the end of the trail will only contain vague and general information. “Various unknown steps” will gradually reveal more information, but usually people will need to SIGN UP for something before they can get all the basic information they want.
“Reverse Funnel System”
RFS is about an “automated sales process”, a system with “funnels and filters” designed to filter away SOME people (the ones not willing to respond to the system) in each step. Only the ones willing to respond will go all the way, from funnels to funnels to joining the opportunity.
The Tony Rush video had the following components:
* (subscribers, people in a list)
* initial video –> link to capture page
* capture page “Claim your position NOW!” –> auto-responder
* auto-responder –> email with second video
* the second video should normally ask for a response
* the rest of the steps are unknown
Legitimate products or services can usually not be sold that way. Vague ideas like “Work with Tony Rush in a brand new organization in a brand new opportunity where you potentially can earn a ton of money” is the typical idea they can be used for.
The idea will need to be VAGUE ENOUGH for people to WANT more information. That will only work if people know right from the start what the trail eventually will lead to. It won’t work if people need to know some details right from the start.
The counter strategy against marketing systems like that is to reveal the factual information. “Reveal all the details”, and the system will fail to work. RFS will only be effective short term, e.g. for a few months in the same geographical market (counting internet communities as “geographical markets” too).
Rippln and CCPro / WMI as examples
We haven’t looked specifically at Reverse Funnel Systems here, but we have seen examples where they have failed.
* Rippln was one example.
* CarbonCopyPRO / WMI was another example.
WMI members successfully abandoned using CCPro as a marketing method. The ones who continued to use CCPro ended up as “losers”, the ones who abandoned the system ended up as “winners” in one geographical market in 2010.
Rippln failed because of other reasons, e.g. they didn’t manage to follow up on those vague promises, it was a “broken chain” (e.g. too long time to WAIT for the people who responded, to when they could go on to the next step). Only the initial steps worked.
Tony posted a pic of him and a Jonathan Case saying they were scheming. Case’s page shows that he is promoting Dubli. Meh.
This link was on Tony Rush’s FB page and the link at the bottom takes you to Dubli. He says he is still with Empower as well.
workwithtonyrush.com/promo/a-quick-update-from-tony/
Here we go again!
Tony Rush has been cross-recruiting front line members of the leadership council of which he supposedly cared about inside of Empower Network.
He’s all nice in his videos saying he’ll work with you now on his new venture with Dubli.
Perhaps someone ought to ask his Empower Network team members what it was like working with him.
IOW – EN is dead. But a shopping mall? Seriously?
Ditto, but I haven’t checked the most recent changes in Dubli.
Some videos found on Youtube indicate they’re selling membership packages to existing members, in the price range $600 — $2,500 — $6,000 — $12,000.
$600 = Team Member TM, basic membership, 5% commission
$2,500 = Team Leader TL, “recruit 3 TM”, 10% comm.
$6,000 = Team Coordinator TC, “recruit 3 TL”, 15% comm.
$12,000 = Sales Director SD, “recruit 3 TC”, 20% comm.
————
Vice President VP = “recruit 5 SD, in 5 separate legs”, 25% comm.
President = “recruit 5 VP, in 5 separate legs”, 27.5% comm.
It means you can pay for positions, or you can recruit your way to a position by recruiting the required downline. To advance beyond those 4 lower positions you’ll need to recruit people.
The shopping mall / cashback is only a “front” and a “feeder program”. The real opportunity seems to be about selling membership packages to existing members.
Norway. That reminds me of Excel back in the 1990’s.
People just paying for the right to recruit. And then getting paid to recruit.
That’s not too legal anymore.
According to Dublinetwork / Facebook, Tony Rush reached the position of Sales Director 22 hours ago. Not too impressive.
* Team Member
* Team Leader = recruit 3 TM
* Team Coordinator = recruit 3 TL
* Sales Director = recruit 3 TC
Sales Director will require a minimum of 39 people in downline (3 Team Coordinators + 9 Team Leaders + 27 Team Members).
943 views = 250 views in 19 or 20 days for his video in post #27.
I also just saw that the two guys from Neucopia formed a team that is joining Dubli. Bunch of people in Dubai…
Awesome to see 100 people going to Dubai, with about 95 of them spending their last money, hoping they’ll come home and actually make the money they were promised.
Here we go again…
Subtle.
Never had been. What was it that the Bible said about tainted source or seed? 😉
Notice how he doesn’t mention David Wood?
@Acroach
Like I said… subtle 🙂
I wonder if Wood will put out the “we stopped cross-recruitment and Rush broke the rules so we gave him the option to resign or we’d terminate him” obligatory explanation.
How many more times can he jump companies with the “It was legal and a good idea when I started with it but…”?
There will always be a core group of sheeple that will follow him from company to company because they can get in first, but he is leaving a trail on the internet of being involved in scam companies…LLI, that coin company, EN and now Dubli.
Nice admission there. Rush “checked out” of Empower months ago. Over the last 90 days (Aug,Sep,Oct), while cross-recruiting out of every leg of Empower Network.
Because of him, the company had to implement a no cross-recruiting policy.
He only resigned because he was about to be terminated. He cashed his weekly Empower checks over the last 90 days while cross-recruiting.
Wow. What a leader. He ought to run for political office. He’d easily get elected because Americans tend to elect people who say one thing and do another.
When you look closely, the followers of Tony Rush are not leaders. They are followers. Leaders see through his bullshit.
The same thing will happen in Wukar. Mark my words.
100% agree- ‘The same thing will happen in Wukar’.
Dubli is a big money grab- all you have to do is look at the ‘leaders’ coming on board and look at their track records.
Has anyone gotten their promised cash back yet? Wukar started promoting 90 days ago.
All we’ve heard about is a half dozen people making money by recuruting others for $2500. No one talks about the incredible commissions they’re receiving from signing up so many customers.
So they’re back to “selling” WordPress and they’re calling it “Kalatu”.
Just another multi-user WordPress install… but with plugins and themes (cue *gasp*).
EN was never about blogging so this probably is going to turn out the same as “Blog Beast”.
The fallout at wukar is happening already. They’re not delivering on the promises they make and Rush continues bash people who simply ask for updates on the “systems” they’ve promised. He’s such an arrogant guy
Dubli is truly a money grab. The top leaders wont even acknowledge you unless you came in at a TLA position ($2,400)
There’s no way of making big money in Dubli unless you’re recruiting.
Rush and John Lavenia are both making statements in their videos “you’ll make 25% of your customers savings” which is total BS. You make 25% of the “Commissionable revenue” which is a fraction of what their saying.
If a customer buys a $1,000 TV at Walmart the CUSTOMER will get 7% back or $70.00 (not bad) These guys make you believe that you’ll make 25% of that $70.00 or $17.50 but you’ll make more like $2
What’s worse is that Rush and his clan have developed a marketing system for Dubli called “Home Business Labs” (with a monthly fee of course) and these are the same guys making promises of these incredible wukar tools for everybody to use.
Matt Trainer is a smart dude and he clearly doesn’t like MLM (because of the crap going on now) so I wouldn’t be surprised if he packed up his tools and moved on to another affiliate based deal without the recruiting drama.
Dubli’s support is about as bad as it gets and the company is in the red big time. They’re bleeding cash and when you ask leadership about this they act like it’s not even an issue. They haven’t even reported their earnings (losses) for the past two years. NASDAQ is a pipe dream my friends.
Total brainwashing.
What’s old is new again. 7 years ago Lavenia and Rush were in business together getting monthly subscriptions ($39.95/mth) from thousands of associates by selling systems (Unified Wealth Solutions) which became their primary business. It looks like the same thing is starting again.
There’s a reason why these guys are easily searchable when you type “John Lavenia Scam” or “Tony Rush Scam” into Google.
And if you do a Google Search on “Matt Trainer Scam” you’ll find he’s had legal trouble in the past. Not good.
Looks like David Sharpe is back on the scene but not with EN. He’s gone solo. Not sure what he is up to – he held a live call last night about selling.
So what’s the latest scoop on EN? Are there any “leaders” left or did everyone jump ship?
Dunno about the leaders, but they’ve gone back to WordPress. Which means we’re back at square 1… only this time they’re bundling “me too” plugins in an attempt to look legit (WordPress is of course free).
Retail would appear to still be insignificant (read: non-existent). David Wood repeatedly tells his affiliate-base to “get 2 a day”, referring the recruitment of new affiliates.
I was watching videos on youtube today and one of the ads that popped up at the beginning of one was Jonathan Cronstedt trying to get people to sign up for the next EN live event which is in April.
I had pretty much forgotten that they were around. Guess a lot of other people have as well.