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  Geebo 8:00 am on July 12, 2019 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: MLM ( 2 ), multi-level marketing ( 2 ), pyramid scheme, Scams ( 1,386 )   

  Are MLMs the biggest scam? 

  

  Let’s say that you’re between jobs and looking for work. You come across an ad for an amazing position that promises flexible hours and an amazing salary, however, it’s a sales position. Sales isn’t the worst thing that you could do and you need a paycheck soon. You may then be asked to join a group of people in a meeting room where you realize that this isn’t just any sales position, it’s an ‘opportunity’ to join the exciting world of multi-level marketing.

  If you’re not familiar with multi-level marketing, or MLMs as they’re commonly known, are those ‘businesses’ that one of your Facebook friends may be trying to recruit you to join. The reason they’re trying to recruit you is that they only really make any kind of money if they get more people to join. The MLMs impress this upon their members to try to recruit their friends and family. Outside of just being annoying when someone tries to recruit you to one of these schemes, there’s a darker side to MLMs. Often, you have to buy stock from the person who recruited you before you can sell your own stock. Many MLMs are accused of having many cult-like tendencies such as pressure to stay and isolation from those critical of MLMs. Sometimes friend or family relationships are severed due to someone’s devotion to an MLM.

  [youtube https://youtu.be/o5xhNXVfPYQ%5D

  The truth is that MLM salespeople tend to not make very much money and in numerous cases wind up in crippling debt. The math just isn’t in their favor. MLMs generally tell their salespeople that they need to recruit a certain number of other people to join the MLM. Then those people also need to recruit the same number of people. What they don’t tell you is that this cycle can only be repeated a handful of times before the number of people needed becomes astronomical and unobtainable. But that’s not the MLM’s problem since they already sold you, and anyone else who’s joined, their product. If this sounds a lot like a pyramid scheme that’s because it essentially is. The only reason there hasn’t been mass prosecution of these MLMs is that the fact that they’re ‘selling’ a product makes their businesses legal.

  In most MLMs, the only people making any real money are the ones at the top of the pyramid and unfortunately, that’s probably not you.

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  Geebo 10:51 am on December 9, 2016 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Facebook ( 180 ), pyramid scheme, Scams ( 1,386 ), wine   

  ‘Tis the season to get scammed on Facebook 

  

  With Christmas fast approaching the scam artists have come out in full force, and where better to scam someone then where fake news rules supreme. In case you’re wondering, I mean Facebook.

  Reports are coming in about secret gift exchanges, such as the ‘Secret Wine Bottle Exchange’. In this particular Facebook post the poster asks for 6 to 36 wine lovers to buy a bottle of wine and send it to someone on the gift exchange list. Then your guaranteed to receive 6 to 36 bottles of wine yourself. While not quite on the level of Bernie Madoff, this is nothing more than a pyramid scheme. Once the person at the top of the pyramid receives their 6 to 36 bottles of wine, they have their ill-gotten booty and the rest of the pyramid is left holding the wineskin. For pyramid schemes to work you have to keep recruiting more and more participants. Eventually it becomes increasingly difficult to recruit more people and the lower tiers of the pyramid are left empty-handed while the top levels have already abandoned this set of marks and have moved on to something new.

  It’s not just wine exchanged though. These scams could appear with a myriad of titles, most referring to some type of ‘secret’ gift exchange promising you unreal returns. If you see someone on your Facebook feed sharing these posts you may want to politely let them know that they’re being scammed.

  While Christmas is a time for sharing and giving, it’s also the most wonderful time of the year for scammers and con artists as they love to prey on people’s spirit of generosity during this season.