NuChoice Compensation Plan v2.0 Review

When I first reviewed NuChoice back in October 2011, although I identified a strong retailable product line I identified potential competition issues between affiliates trying to market it.

In short, NuChoice affiliates were able to set their own retail prices which could result in existing and established affiliates undercutting new affiliates. This would as such make it difficult for a new affiliate to get into the business and concentrate on generating retail sales.

This left new affiliates having to focus on preferred customers and affiliate recruitment, which seemed to pay more but offered less of a stable business to work with over the long-term.

Almost two years after I first reviewed NuChoice, the company has decided to change its compensation plan and add a matrix component to what was otherwise a standard unilevel plan.

Read on for a review of NuChoice’s new v2.0 compensation plan.

Affiliate Membership Options

Affiliates can now join NuChoice via four membership options:

• Associate (15% product discount) – $15 once off fee
• Silver (30% product discount) – $39 a month (autoship)
• Gold (35% product discount) – $49 a month (autoship)
• Platinum (50% product discount) – $59 a month (autoship)

Retail Commissions

Retail commissions are paid out to NuChoice affiliates at a flatrate 15% on retail orders.

Preferred retail customer orders (autoship) are paid out 20% at the Associate level and 30% for Silver, Gold and Platinum affiliates.

Recruitment Commissions

NuChoice affiliates who sign up for Silver or higher affiliate membership qualify for recruitment commissions when they sign up Silver or higher affiliates.

• Silver affiliate – $20 on the recruitment of a Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate ($5 to their upline)
• Gold affiliate – $20 on the recruitment of a Silver affiliate and $25 on the recruitment of a Gold or Platinum affiliate ($5 to their upline)
• Platinum affiliate – $20 on the recruitment of a Silver affiliate, $25 on the recruitment of a Gold affiliate and $30 on the recruitment of a Platinum affiliate (upline earns $5 on a Silver or Gold affiliate and $7.50 for a Platinum)

Matrix Commissions

Newly introduced in NuChoice’s v2.0 compensation plan are matrix commissions via a 2×15 matrix.

A 2×15 matrix places an affiliate at the top of the matrix, with two positions directly under them (level 1).

These two positions branch out into another two positions (level 2), which in turn branch out into another positions (level 3) and so on and so forth down a total of 15 levels.

Each position in a NuChoice affiliate’s 2×15 matrix represents a recruited affiliate (Silver or higher), with affiliates being paid $2 per position filled in their matrix.

Positions can be filled either via the direct recruitment affiliates (Silver or higher) or the recruiting efforts of an affiliate’s up and downlines.

How many levels of a matrix an affiliate is paid out on depends on their affiliate membership rank and additional qualification criteria:

• Silver – earn on up to five matrix levels
• Gold (recruit at least two affiliates (Associate or Silver) or one Gold or higher affiliate) – earn on up to ten matrix levels
• Platinum (recruit at least four affiliates (Associate of Silver) or two Platinum affiliates) – earn on all fifteen available matrix levels

Unilevel Commissions

Unilevel commissions in NuChoice are paid out on the affiliate subscription fees paid by Silver, Gold and Platinum affiliates. Or as NuChoice put it:

The unilevel commission is paid from product purchases or select services made in your downline organisation, based on each product’s BV that is associated with the purchase at a given level of the subscription.

Seeing as only affiliates can have a Silver, Gold or Platinum “subscription” (not to be confused with regular autoship), this equates to unilevel commissions being paid out of affiliate subscriptions only.

A unilevel team places an affiliate at the top of the team with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1).

If any of these level 1 affiliates go on to recruit new affiliates of their own, they are placed on level 2 and so on and so forth down a total payable 8 levels.

How many levels a NuChoice affiliate is paid out on depends on their own personal purchased affiliate rank:

• Silver – 5% on level 1 and 8% on level 2
• Gold – 5% on level 1 and 8% on levels 2 and 3
• Platinum – 5% on level 1, 8% on levels 2 and 3, 5% on level 4, 3% on level 5 and 2% on levels 6 to 8

Generation Bonus

NuChoice’s Generation Bonus effectively extends unilevel commissions past the available initial eight levels. It does not however pay on generated business volume but rather is a simple recruitment commission.

The General Bonus pays out an additional 50 cents for every recruited Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate in each unilevel leg, up until an affiliate of a specified rank is found in that leg.

• 1 Star (recruit 15 Platinum affiliates) – 50 cents on each Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate paid until the next 1 Star ranked affiliate is found in a unilevel leg
• 2 Star (recruit 25 Platinum affiliates) – 50 cents on each Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate paid until the next 2 Star ranked affiliate is found in a unilevel leg
• 3 Star (recruit 50 Platinum affiliates) – 50 cents on each Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate paid until the next 3 Star ranked affiliate is found in a unilevel leg
• 4 Star (recruit 100 Platinum affiliates) – 50 cents on each Silver, Gold or Platinum affiliate paid until the next 4 Star ranked affiliate is found in a unilevel leg

All recruited Platinum affiliates must be active (be paying their autoship fee) in order to count for the Star rank qualification recruitment totals.

Note that each unilevel leg is treated independently to the rest. Also note that if no Star ranked affiliate exists in a unilevel leg, that the 50 cent bonus pays out down a theoretically infinite number of levels.

Joining NuChoice

Affiliate membership to NuChoice is available in four initial options:

• Associate – $15 once off fee
• Silver – $39 a month
• Gold – $49 a month
• Platinum – $59 a month

After two months Silver Gold and Platinum affiliates are given the option of increasing their monthly subscription fee, by signing up for what they call “Elite” affiliate membership:

• Silver Elite – $69 a month
• Gold Elite – $89 a month
• Platinum Elite – $119 a month

The compensation plan for Elite affiliate membership is the same, with the only difference being the increased monthly fee (and BV generated).

Conclusion

Prior to their compensation plan changes, NuChoice’s biggest identifiable obstacle was the variable retail prices the company allowed affiliates to charge.

Post compensation plan changes, it’s entirely disappointing to see a gravitated shift away from focus on retail, in favour of affiliate subscription plans and recruitment.

The crux of NuChoice’s new compensation plan is that you can sign up as an affiliate, pay your monthly fees (required to participate and earn commissions), recruit others who do the same and be paid for it.

Every qualification in the plan revolves around affiliates paying monthly fees and/or recruiting new affiliates. The Star qualification ranks are the most prominent example of this, where affiliates are required to recruit only Platinum affiliates and get paid based on how many monthly fee paying affiliates exist in their downline.

Retail commissions still exist to NuChoice’s credit but, let’s be honest here, with the bulk of the compensation plan paying out on monthly affiliate fees and recruitment, the likelihood of affiliates bothering with retail is going to be slim to none.

Certainly not enough to offset all the affiliate recruitment matrix building that’s inevitably bound to wind up becoming the core focus of the opportunity.

An argument could be made that the affiliate subscription fees revolve around the purchase of products, but the fact remains that they are merely attached to what can otherwise only be attributed as an affiliate fee. This is the case as there is nothing else differentiating an affiliate from a retail customer other than payment of said fee.

Not to mention the direct recruitment commissions paid out on the recruitment of Silver, Gold and Platinum affiliates – which pretty much negates any product-based argument given that it’s paid out once-off upon recruitment of a new affiliate.

And then finally of course is the underlying issue of the motive of affiliate’s autoship purchases. By enacting mandatory autoship for matrix and unilevel commissions (the core of NuChoice’s residual commission offer), whether or not NuChoice affiliates are buying the product for anything other than commission qualification becomes a difficult case to make.

The take away? Retail is entirely possible in NuChoice’s new compensation plan but is likely to be cast aside in favour of autoship fee paying affiliate recruitment.