Shivram Kumar - the greatest liar

Look at the FAQ section in Kumar Shivram's PROFILES DVD.

BWW stock code is PRD1. If you do not know, Kumar & Anjali are double diamonds in Amway Global/BWW business.

This fellow has lied, lied and lied in it through his teeth. Mr. honesty, Mr. integrity - that is what is portrayed, but here is how he dodges the truth, contradicts himself and tries to convince the gullible prospect into signing up:

(1) What are my chances of success?

His answer to this question is not direct. He uses the well-known "analogy" technique. All people seasoned in Amway/quixtar use this technique to dodge the facts and to divert peoples' focus on to something else.

He compares Amway/quixtar with exercise. It sounds perfectly logical when you hear it. He talks about 9 core steps - you need to do these - to succeed. He says many people do not do the 9 core steps and that is why they do not succeed. So the analogy is "people join a gym and they do not work out" similarly "people join Amway and don't do the work".

Why don't they do it? Because many people who join are not informed about the "whole deal" when they sign up. They are given partial information and get signed up. They think if they join, do a 100 PV every month and then recruit other people, then they can succeed. Many of them are not told about the 9 core steps when they sign up, so they join but then later on quit.

Alright, Kumar - why don't you just take the people who do the 9 core steps and then calculate the chance of success?

The point is one cannot really tell who are doing the 9 core steps, because some of them are not measurable. Here are the 9 core steps:

(1) Show 3 to 5 plans a week
(2) Do 300 PV personal volume (couple) or 150 PV personal volume (single) including customer volume
(3) Do 50 PV customer volume minimum
(4) Listen to CD daily (start with 1/day and then increase to 2/day)
(5) Read daily (start at 15 min/day and increase to 1 hour/day)
(6) Attend all associations - open (every Tue/Wed), PASE (every Fri), phone meeting (every Sun), weekend functions, BBS, upline promotions, etc.,
(7) Build your business with integrity and honesty
(8) Counsel monthly with counseling sheet
(9) Communikate

Steps (7) and (8) are not measurable. A guy who does not sell (i.e. does not do step (3) above) and reports 50 PV customer volume through CVR or CSAR is failing on step (7) as well. Many BWW IBOs do not sell products. Uplines encourage them to simply report CVR or CSAR.

Step (8) again has lots of caveats to it.

So what they conclude is that the people who are succeeding are only the people who do the 9 core steps, so they conclude the converse: "let us see who is succeeding. They are the only ones doing the 9 core steps."

The fact is many people do all the 9 core steps for several years and still do not succeed. That is where your upline will tell you things like "you are not using the power of spoken word", "you are not in submission to upline", "your husband-wife relationship is not good", "you are not caring about people", etc., to make you believe that if you set that right, then it will work for you. The point is they never accept the fact that it is very very tough to build and maintain your network, even after doing all of these steps.

Another thing to note is that to do the 9 core steps above it takes a LOT of time. They lie to you telling it takes 6 to 10 hours a week to build this business! Kumar says this below himself. LIAR.

For step (1) above, you need to do the 4 basics i.e. contact, invite, show the plan, follow up/sign up. You will run out of your A and B lists (friends and acquaintances) very fast and will have to do this with C list (strangers). The success rate of converting a contact to a plan/overview is 20% or less with C list. So you need to contact 15 to 25 people every week to show 3 to 5 plans per week. This is why people run around in malls, grocery stores, Costco, Wal-mart, literally everywhere to make these contacts. It takes a lot of time to contact those many people, usually 20 hours per week. This contradicts Kumar's answer to question (2) below.

(From those 12 to 20 plans/month, you usually 1 or 2 signed up. Amway guys tell you should read more or listen to more CDs or go with proper expectation to dodge the fact that the business simply does not work.)

Also people treat you like trash when they figure out that you are an Amway guy. So you usually dodge that by saying something like you own a company or you own a social-networking site or some other smart term like "private franchizing" so you are taught to LIE, LIE and LIE. Many of them trash you when you call them. Many do "no shows" i.e. they do not come for the plan when you set up an appointment. Many do "no shows" at the open meeting. Many do "no shows" at the follow up and run away with your CDs, literature pack, etc., So sign up is a distant dream, when you make one contact...

Kumar says "life is all about freedom to succeed and freedom to fail" - the success ratio in Amway is less than 1%. Why do 99% people fail, Kumar? Because you guys do not tell the whole deal when they sign up. You cheat them and get them signed up and then you put one thing after another on them. Yeah - you have an analogy telling "they do not tell you the whole deal when you join a company. they only tell you what to do next." - So you are just as cheap as my company, not any better, so stop claiming that Amway is the best. You are just like my company, which according to you, STINKS. So Amway STINKS according to your own statements.


(2) How much time will I need to invest?

Ok - the truth - if you see how Kumar worked to go diamond... he has said he attended 3 to 4 open meetings per week (in 2 locations in New Jersey, 1 in Long Island, 1 in Philadelphia) and then 1 PASE at his house and then showed 5 plans during the weekends. Along with that, you add the other 8 core steps. It takes anywhere from 40 to 60 hours a week to do that. He lies telling maximum he has seen done is 15 hours/wk. Kumar - I agree with you that people make money with Amway, but why do you lie like this to get gullible prospects in?

Kumar lies here telling people can build this in 4 hours/week. Even the open meeting itself takes more than 4 hours/week including the commute and night owl. KUMAR - you are a master liar, man! Come on! Tell the truth! Are those people really getting results???

You are lying that you do not know what to tell if people have more than 20 hours per week? When you went diamond, how many sleepless nights you had? You guys are good at dodging work in your office by writing poetry or sleeping in bathrooms, but how long could someone do that???


(3) I know all about this business.

He says "maybe you were in this business before. Ok. You have 2 options. Do you want to find out more? Do you want to know what has changed? Or do you want to say forget it...?"

What has changed? Maybe some products. Maybe stuff in double-X is new now... maybe some bad products were removed. Nothing has changed overall. It is still the same old raw deal.


(4) Does quixtar really pay those bonuses?

Easy question. Quixtar/Amway is black-and-white - no gray areas like the systems. So this is easy to answer. Nothing to hide here. They have products and prices and bonuses. You do the analysis and decide for yourself what to buy, what to sell, etc., They tell you, in writing, all the rules. You are supposed to read and sign it when you join. Many people do not read the Amway/quixtar documents, so they end up believing the lies told by the IBOs.

"System income" part is where the gray area is. New IBOs are not told about the 9 core steps above and how steps (4), (5) and (6) above contribute to system income for higher pins. This is hidden for all IBOs below platinum. Why don't you make it public and tell the new IBOs all the facts??? What is the secret behind the money collected for associations, CDs, books and leaderships?

Quixtar/amway pays you only on volume. If you do not requalify, they do not pay you. But BWW/WWDB/LTD, etc., pay fake diamonds and fake emeralds bcos once you qualify once, you are always that pin in the system, not in quixtar. Yes, Amway may still say you are that pin according to the official Amway blog post here, but they won't pay you that much! They will only pay you how much business you brought to them!


(5) Aren't the products expensive?

YES, YES and YES. To do 300 PV personal volume will take you close to $950. If you sell some of that, then still you spend more than $700 per month for products that you might have spent only less than $100 outside... products are of good quality, but you decide.

He says it is not a discount buying club. So Mr. Kumar, why do you say in all your open meetings people can save up to 30% of money that they are already spending? then why do you lie telling people can re-direct their "anyway" money?

He says "at the 15% level you are getting your products for free". A totally unqualified statement and a lie. He assumes ppl are doing 100 PV - which is supposed to cost $250. Even that is true only if you have good structure and you make some sales. You will be spending close to $1200 to $1500 per month to do the 9 core steps, so you will need to go at least 4000 PV, 21%, to break even! Kumar, the LIAR.


(6) How much can I really make?

After all the untold expenses, you will break even only when you make $1500 to $2000/month.

Kumar says "we are upfront and honest about income representations" - really? Why don't you say platinums actually make only $1000/month to $1500/month, bcos most of them have only less than 3 legs, not the 6 legs shown at the open meeting plan. You portray the first lie the very first time the plan is exposed to prospects telling platinums make $2600/month and you claim you are upfront and honest? You lie in the DVD too!

At the diamond level, he says there is $150,000 of "ongoing" income. The figure is OK, but "ongoing". So Kumar, how many of your diamonds requalified last year as diamonds and had their "ongoing" income and how many of them are still running around as fake diamonds making only $100K/yr from Amway and then probably raking up through BWW income? Ok - what is the status of Ramesh & Ramaa, Ajay & Alka, Nanda & Sangita? Did they EVER requalify as diamonds? Somehow only Sugeet seems to make it to diamond club and Peter Island every year, so WHAT is the mystery here with all your other diamonds?

And you guys still lie telling 100 PV = $250. How long has it been since that changed, but your plan has not?


(7) I am a student. How can I build this business?

The truth is, if you are an F-1 student you should not legally do any work outside your school. But many students work illegally and never get caught, so you can work in Amway illegally too. Many students who work illegally do not have their incomes reported to the IRS. They get paid in cash. But Amway considers you as an independent contractor and reports your income to the IRS in form 1099-Misc. You cannot have a 1099-Misc if you are on F-1 visa. The IRS does not care what your visa status as long as you pay your taxes. But if the USCIS finds out, you may be in trouble. Your upline usually responds to this by telling "1099-Misc is fine" or "even foreigners can own Amway business in USA". But neither Amway nor your upline nor the system has any proof telling F-1 students can earn income through Amway. You do it at your own risk. To my knowledge, no one has been caught by USCIS, but even if they are caught, Amway diamonds will never disclose it in public, since many F-1 students will quit and the diamond income will drop.

And I have never seen a single student making substantial income through Amway when they were a student. The amounts are so pathetic that nobody cares! But your 100 PV counts for your upline.

You cannot do Amway if you are on H1-B visa or J1 visa too. "1099-INV" - investment income and stock market income are fine. Even real estate income is fine, but independent contractor income thru 1099-Misc is not fine. Make sure you check with an immigration attorney before you join Amway. The fee of $200 or so for the immigration attorney is a lot less than the pain of deportation.

OK, finally why do I care?

Because I believed in all these lies and wasted substantial amount of money, time and energy in this. I do not want anyone else to fall into the same trap. And I am not against the 0.001% of the people who make money honestly with Amway, but tell your prospects the whole deal and let them decide. Do not lie to them and keep changing the deal as people start believing you more.

Amway/BWW justifications

If you have read my other posts, you know how professional Amway diamonds and IBOs are when it comes to telling lies. But in their minds, they always justify the lies they are telling as truths, and that too, very convincingly. You see, when you lie, your conscience is pricking you from the inside, so you try to justify to yourself and to others that you are actually not lying.

If you listen to Kumar and Anjali's diamond story, Kumar says he had to 'somehow' get people to functions. If the function is in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, which is 14 hours away from New Jersey (where Kumar and his prospect/downline live), then he would tell the function is "6 plus" hours away. Kumar justifies this by telling he is not lying and 14 is indeed "6 plus". Yes, 14 is "6 plus", but you see, that is the amount of truth in many statements made by Amway diamonds and IBOs.

When they quote the average incomes for Q12's they always quote like
Q12 platinums & above - $55,000/yr
So people think that an average Q12 platinum makes $55,000/yr. WRONG! They added all the Q12's and above, which means all emeralds, diamonds and above too, so there are a few people whose incomes are huge that will skew the average for Q12's higher!

Another example: a common 'prospecting' statement used by Amway IBOs to strangers is
"Hei, you look familiar. Have we met before?"
even though they know they never met this person before. Again their conscience is hurting when they lie that way. Amway diamond Vishal Jain justifies this nicely by telling
"Of course, I have seen human beings before. He has 2 eyes, 1 nose, 1 mouth, 2 ears, so he does look familiar. Every human being looks familiar to me."

These are just two examples, but many statements made by Amway/BWW guys are as truthful as the above.

The irony is that Amway IBOs think they are actually doing good to people by making them do anything for Amway/BWW, so they justify to themselves that lying to their prospects/downline is actually OK.

BWW function promotion lies and horrors

Winter conference/dream night is coming soon and I am sure there are promotions after every open meeting for the function. Ah, how many lies to promote the function!!!

First lie: the number of people who are expected to attend. They usually hype the numbers.

In BWW, they usually conduct the East coast function in Richmond, VA at the Richmond coliseum. Different IBOs say anywhere from 17,000 to 30,000 is the number of people expected to attend. If you read the wikipedia page on Richmond coliseum, the capacity is clearly mentioned as

Capacity
13,553 (concerts)
11,992 (basketball)
11,088 (hockey)

Even if there are chairs on the floor adding 2000 people, it still comes to only 15,000.

Same deal in California. The function usually happens in San Jose civic auditorium. The IBOs claim that 6,000 to 8,000 people are going to attend. The capacity of the auditorium is clearly mentioned as 3,000!

Second lie: they say about 15 to 20 multi-millionaires and "financially free" people are going to come and teach.

These are unqualified statements, especially in California, Texas and mid-West functions, because most speakers are only emeralds. Most of them have full-time jobs, so they are not financially free. Also many of them are fake emeralds - Amway itself accepts this on their blog here. Also many diamonds are not really even millionaires, forget "multi" millionaires. I accept that some guys qualify, maybe two or three speakers, in these smaller functions.

Third lie: Nobody makes money by a prospect attending function.

Lot of people make money. First of all, many of the coliseums are free to rent because the coliseum makes money via parking and food sales (I know at least this is true for Richmond coliseum). Second, they ask you who your upline emerald and diamond are before buying a ticket. Many of your uplines and mainly, the function speakers do get paid from the money you paid to purchase the function ticket.

Fourth lie: The event is already sold out.

The BWW guys will sell tickets, even if the coliseums are full. In my experience, only once there was an overflow situation in BWW in east coast for about 100 or 200 people (long time ago, when John & Jennie Bell Crowe and Jack & Magee Spencer were still in BWW)! There are usually hundreds or thousands of empty seats in all functions!

Fifth lie: The next major function is one year from now.

Major functions happen once every 3 months. The open meeting speakers simply say "when is the next winter? next year... so you need to wait one year to attend the next function." So what about the spring leadership? (Oh, am I forgetting that it is a different function?)

Sixth lie: The speakers at the function.

They usually show pictures of the top BWW diamonds and say they will all be there. Maybe this is true for East coast functions, but for California and Texas functions, not all diamonds speak!

Seventh lie: This is a lie told before the function to all new guys. The up line cautions the new IBO by telling "You need to use grocery store approach in the function. When you go to grocery store, you only pick up what you want. You don't care about rest of the stuff... like, if you are a vegetarian, you do not care about the meat section. Same way, take what you want from the function and do not worry about the rest..."

This is typical cult training, because initially many things told from stage will not make sense to you. Some points will make you mad, but your up line already prepared you, so you ignore it. Remember, whatever each speaker tells from stage is exactly what BWW is. There is no grocery store approach. While you may initially ignore them thinking grocery store approach, BWW will bombard you the same statements with CDs and more functions soon. The more you hear something, the more you believe it to be true. So if you don't like even one thing at the function, then be wise and walk away! Otherwise you will soon lose your identity with BWW training and will believe whatever they say!

So like Kumar sings on his CD, I want to sing the Hindi movie song "la la lai lai... la la lala lai.. lai... lie... lie..."

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Ok, next some of the horrors I experienced in BWW functions and conferences:

1. There are huge queues that people form roughly 7 to 8 hours before each session begins on Fridays and Saturdays. Many IBOs do not sleep in their hotel rooms on Friday nights; they simply wait outside the coliseum door, sometimes in open! (Usually new IBOs stay in hotel room and their uplines stand in queues and get the new IBOs some front seats.) While front row mentality is good, what I always saw was "front row hooliganism". Many IBOs will crush you, shove you aside, jump over you, cut lines mercilessly and run a 100-metre dash once the coliseum door opens! Then there are "security" IBOs to police these guys. Many IBOs reserve multiple seats, when the "BWW policy" is 2 seats per person - one for yourself and one for your spouse or down line. But many times, many IBOs fight and take multiple seats! This is prime example of how much BWW IBOs are brain washed! (I was no exception when I was in BWW, but I was always irritated by this.)

2. Night owls: The function timings are already too late - they end around mid night. But they do not leave you after that. They take you to upline diamond night owl, which goes up to 1:30 AM. Then your up line emerald or platinum will hold another night owl till 3 AM. So forget your sleep. (XS and rhodiola never helped me stay up for anything :-).)

3. Noise inside the function: Amway business may not be for you, if you hate noisy environments. Pretty much all Amway meetings are purposely made very noisy - to show excitement and "attract" new people. Functions are especially extremely noisy.

4. IBOs rushing to cheer for diamonds: Before every speaker starts speaking, several IBOs rush to the front to cheer for them. IBOs run like crazy to create an "excited" environment. If you are not careful, you may be stepped on and crushed.

5. Food: You have to pretty much survive on nutrilite food bars for all 3 days. Your up line will load you with them, but by the time you eat your 3rd bar, you will be craving for some proper food. You dare not step out, especially if you are a new IBO. Your up line will come rushing after you to see where you are going. (You know, you may miss some important point the speaker is making.) If you brought any "ethnic" food inside the function and eat it, your upline will make some indirect comments about you in the night/day owl so you better not eat anything nice for those 3 days.

6. Your outputs: well, this is embarrassingly "cult"ish. They ask you not to go for #1 or #2 because, again, you may miss a golden statement. So empty your bladder and bowels before going in. You need to hold it for 4 hours minimum. (Tip to get good seat: Go inside without emptying your bowels. You can clear all the people around you pretty quickly :-)).

7. Veteran IBO: If you are a seasoned IBO without any new people the function pretty much "stinks" for you. But you dare not keep a sad face. You will be severely chastised by your up line.

8. Cheering: You need to rotate your hand above your head and say "uh......... uh... uh.. freedom" and punch your fist in the air - else you won't be "part of the team" ... and in some cases scream "flush that stinking job" after that... (don't flush it too soon!)

9. Photos: If you do not like to take too many pictures of yourself with others, let your up line know strictly. They will force you to take pix with several "top leaders".

10. Music: If you do not like to party and dance, skip the music sessions before the training sessions. They are extremely noisy! Your up line may not allow though, because you are not setting the right example for your down lines...

With that said, there are lot of good points covered in the conference... very good training on many things! Except most people in BWW do not follow them. What they teach from stage and what is actually practiced were totally different in my experience! What a pity that I believed and did whatever they taught from stage and put up with my horrible up lines, and still did not succeed after several years! (By the way, I am not sitting with just my underwear and blogging now like diamonds say about bloggers like me, in case you were wondering...)

To my fired up cross lines

Well, I am quite shocked to see how many people I thought to be "core" IBOs (i.e. people who listen to their uplines and the system) actually are spending more and more time on blog sites like mine :-). Some of them leave threatening comments. Some of them send me nice emails. Some ask me whether I am "man enough" to publish their comments - ah, typical Amway statements from "core" IBOs repeating statements they heard on CDs!

Funny thing is - you fired up IBOs are not listening to your "upline leaders". Haven't you active IBOs heard that you are not supposed to read "negative" web sites? By the way, are you done with your 9 core steps today that you are coming here and spending time? Go and look at your calendar first. Also you are forgetting Bill Britt's teaching about dilution, that you should "cap the negative". Listen to your CDs first and follow them. You first go at least Q12 platinum without buying extra products and without forcing a single down line of yours to stock up products - then I will acknowledge your "success".

I feel sorry for many of you active IBOs as well. You haven't honestly sat down and done your income/expense calculations. Some of you guys have been in for 10 years and not yet Q12 platinums. How could you guys show the plan to someone else and tell the other fellow that you would help him go platinum in 3 to 6 months? (Or has it reduced to 2 to 4 months now?)

I personally know more than 10 people who built the business to very successful levels and later quit. They had more success than me, but they did not take the effort to let the public know about the truth. I am not telling what happened to me is what happens in every line of sponsorship, but I believe it is close to what happened to me. Otherwise, how could some of you guys who qualified silvers and platinums, have a grand total of 10 people at the function? And how come 90% of the platinums do not qualify Q12 the same year and many do not go Q12 for several years after they went platinum? Why doesn't every emerald go founders emerald the same year?

As much as so many of you cross lines and down lines of me are frustrated, you go and look at the dreams on your refrigerator. How many have come true? How many dreams have you taken off your refrigerator? What about the time frame it took you to reach any goal?

My dear cross line, please don't tell me your upline's success. I want to know about your success.

And don't think that it is because of my blog that you are not succeeding. The simple fact of the matter is "show 12, sponsor 2" does not work and has not been working for several years. "Tap rooting" did not "transform" your business! "XS technique" does not still bring 10 guests to every open meeting. These are just temporary promotions to keep people excited!

You will simply not accept the truth now, because you believe so much that this would work for you!

All I hope with my blog is that IBOs who are thinking about taking advantage of their downlines will be a bit scared. They know that their names could become quite notorious on the internet if they play around with their downlines' lives. My upline violated several cardinal rules. I have every reason to believe that many uplines are like that.

If you are building your business very honestly, then do it by all means and succeed. Let your down lines write blogs about how "wonderful" you are.

And listen to this - you guys did not go through the hell we went through. If your upline is so wonderful and so successful, GOOD FOR YOU. If you want to brag about your upline, you start your own blog (you don't need to pay $200 for it like you need to pay when you sign up with Amway; starting a blog is truly free) and write good things about your upline. Let your positive blog come up higher in google, before negative blogs like mine. I will write what I want in my blog about my experiences and my opinions. Deal???

Rather than coming to my blog and asking me whether I am "man enough" to publish your comment, I want to ask you the same question. Are you "man enough" to stop the problem at its source? You know who my uplines are! You should confront them as to why they do such horrible things to their down lines and create a bad name for Amway and all of you honest (and not fake pin) IBOs and your super-honest upline leaders who have not got any of their downlines to stock up even 2 PV for their goals. Is it making sense to you?

Amway women

BWW/Amway guys usually criticize women a lot, because they claim women pull men down with their words.

Women are usually more intuitive than men. They can feel that something is not right with Amway, whereas men are usually blind to feelings. Women are more perceptive. Many women can feel that the way Amway business is being built is not right. Also they can accept the fact that Amway does not produce the income that is promised at the open meetings in the promised time frame for 99.99999% of the people. Men usually have a big ego and cannot accept facts as they are. While "facts don't count" thinking helps in many cases, in Amway's case, it works against you.

To make people stay in the business, the BWW diamonds keep bombarding the male IBOs with statements like the following:

"Your wife is at the same income level as you are. If you listen to her, you will be at her level. So quit listening to her. Listen to your upline."

"Are you the man in the house? Or are you the mouse in the house? Are you in control of your family or are you letting your wife control it?"

"Women are short-term thinkers. Men are long-term thinkers. So if your wife is complaining about not making money with Amway today, don't worry about it. You know that this will work for you long term..."

I can also remember listening to such vulgar statements (Oh, Bill Britt claims there is no vulgarity in BWW, but he himself says these):

"If you are listening to your wife more than your upline, then you get her pink panties and put them on... Is your pant zipper in the front or on the side?"

and on and on and on...

Men like hearing such statements, because it gives them a feeling of importance. Women can see these statements as manipulation, but in most cases they have to keep quiet.

IBO men! Wake up! If your income sucks after 1 or 2 years of whatever work you are able to do in Amway, then quit wasting your life in Amway! You will be a lot more happier!

Amway/Amway global IBO priorities

In Amway/BWW/WWDB, they teach that you should prioritize your life as follows:

Put God first

Then put your family

Then put job

Then take care of business

Then put everything else

(Notice that your health is not even there... oh, am I forgetting that there is Nutrilite and you don't really need 30 mins of exercise daily until you go diamond?)

While this is very nice to hear, the diamonds contradict this with other statements like:

"When you are going eagle, platinum or diamond, you may temporarily put family and job below business."

The funny thing is temporary can be about 10 or 20 years! The fellows who qualified diamond last year in BWW have all been in for this long! (Why most of them won't requalify diamond this year is no mystery, since they all had fake platinum legs.)

You will also hear:

"Leave your baby with the baby sitter. Your baby is not going to remember who changed his/her diaper. He/she will love you when you give him/her the choice to pick any car he/she wants, when he/she is 16 or 18 years old."

The funny thing is your baby will be gone by the time you are done with your Amway "project"! (Hopefully your baby does not follow you, because your income with about 99.9% accuracy is pathetic!) The little precious moments you can have with your babies are all stolen by Amway! If Amway works for you, I am happy for you. But once you lose the time with your baby during their initial years, it is gone FOREVER! So if you are an active Amway IBO, do listen to your heart, along with listening to your uplines!

My upline (some of you know who I am, so you know my upline) would force all of his downlines to go for a long-distance trip the 2nd weekend after they had a baby! He would say that shows the commitment of the IBO to his downline! In my experience, people figure you out - they know you are not genuinely interested in them and you are making the trip only for your own assurance that you are working hard!

If Amway IBOs put GOD first, then they would never do anything illegal, but you know from my other posts that they do so many illegal things, right from faking customer orders, to manipulating IBOs to stock up products.

They tell in the CDs that GOD is always protecting the Amway business. I believe that if God is really behind this, then He should clean up the people who do all illegal activities, which will be close to 90% of BWW.

Analogies always to the rescue!

Amway diamonds and emeralds are very good with analogies. The analogies are so convincing when you hear them that you think you are a fool to think otherwise. But they are very carefully crafted.

One striking example of this analogy trap I remember is with respect to the corporation name change. As you might know, quixtar was originally Amway business. Amway then changed to quixtar when it went online. Then they realized that quixtar brand name was not flying too good, so 10 years later they decided to go back to the old name Amway and put a global behind it and call it 'Amway global', to make it sound like a new business. So now the business is called Amway global.

One diamond, named Sanjiv & Shauna Sahay made 2 CDs at different times about handling objections.

The first one was made when the name was quixtar. One of the questions you used to face from a prospect those days was "Is quixtar not the same as Amway?" To handle this question, Sanjiv suggested the following analogy to be used by IBOs:

IBO: "Do you know who makes Lexus?"

Prospect: "Toyota"

IBO: "Why don't they call it as 'toyota plus'? Why do they call it a different name?"

Prospect: "But lexus is different..."

The prospect is now confused. (One of my uplines' favorite statement was 'If you cannot convince them, confuse them'.)

Then the IBO can really nail the prospect by telling

"See quixtar is a different brand, just like lexus is a different brand. It is as ridiculous to say quixtar is just amway, like it is telling lexus is same as toyota."

(Of course, many times the prospect does not get convinced with this and finds some other reason not to sign up. But you see, whether the prospect gets convinced or not, all the IBOs, who are already in and are themselves confused, are now convinced. Because once you sign up, you need to defend your decision to sign up - so you look for reasons to defend your decision. The main job of these analogies is to keep the confused IBOs in for longer, rather than use them on new prospects.)

Then the name changed from quixtar to amway global. Sanjiv Sahay made another CD about handling objections. In this one, he uses another analogy.

"What does microsoft name itself when it goes to India? you know... they name it Microsoft India, you know. They don't call it zebra.com, you know... is that correct, you know? Same thing here, you know. We are creating one global brand, you know... you know... One amway global brand you know..."

(Yes, Sanjiv Sahay uses those many 'you know' when he is talking. If it was irritating for you to read those many 'you know's here, then imagine listening to a CD made by him with half the talk being just 'you know's... and pay $7.50 plus tax for that CD!!!)

So who is the fool here? The guy who Amway IBOs calls as a LOSER, or the Amway IBO himself???

BWW emerald pact

One statement that attracted me initially to BWW was that the emeralds and above had a pact i.e. an agreement, that if something were to happen to an emerald, then the BWW leadership will help the 3 legs to remain at least platinums. I thought that once I build to emerald, then I will have the promised residual income. Only now I realize that this is a BIG lie.

I know of one emerald, let me call them BBX (letters are transposed), who was very inspiring and motivating. When I was active in the business, I used to look up to them a lot, because they were local to me. They were not my upline, but were part of my upline diamond's team. We also used to attend PASE (Product And System Education) meetings at their home every Friday evening and we could watch them and their kids in close quarters. They were one of the biggest reasons for me to stay in the business during my initial years. I still respect them for who they were.

I saw this emerald and his wife struggle to go diamond. He tried all kinds of self-motivation techniques. He had a big electronic clock in his living room with a count down to the day he would qualify diamond. He even flew to Russia when the Amway business opened there. He thought he could break at least one leg quickly in the new Russian market. He gave me a Russian plan DVD that he made with the help of a translator for me to use with my Russian prospects!

This emerald became inactive a few years ago. When his wife called me telling they will no longer be hosting PASE meetings at their home, she told they were going through some personal situation. But I don't think that is the only reason they left. Honest people like BBX could never stay in a deal like Amway/BWW for long, that too with a dishonest person like my upline diamond. I had to go to another emerald's PASE meeting in my local area... I and my wife were so sad for many years after they left!

After a few years, somehow I did not see BBX's name in the Amway global magazines as q12. I know that he at least had 2 big North American q12 legs (1 in San Jose and another in Minneapolis) when I became inactive, but BBX's name was missing even before I quit. His downlines names appeared in the magazine as q12s though and they went to ACHIEVERS trip!

What could have happened to BBX's IBOship? What happened to the "emerald pact"? I think that my upline diamond just suckered the 2 legs as his personal legs and let the 3rd leg quit.

Whatever "pact" BWW has is all ultimately a lie. These guys just give empty promises. The worst thing is you can't even make sure that the people who give you promises will be part of BWW few years later. If you know Kanti and Hemi Gala, then you know what I am talking about. They were EDCs with BWW, who are no longer part of BWW.

The whole thing is a big bottomless pit full of lies - once you get in, you just keep going deeper and deeper and deeper! Slowly you become part of it and you don't even know you are becoming a liar. The cult-like brain control they have with CDs, books, meetings, kate, etc., will give you no time to think rationally. You just become like a robot, trying to repeat the same statements, and soon lose your identity! And if you finally realize you do want to become inactive in the wonderfully "residual" business, you don't even get peanuts for all the hard work you did.

An innovative prospecting approach

When you are in the Amway global/BWW business, every few years, they come up with a new technique. The way they promote it is that it is going to "transform" your business and you are going to have huge success if you follow it.

When I was active in the business, they did several promotions like this. The first one I remember was when XS introduced new flavors. Greg Duncan made a CD titled "XS energy drink sells like a million bucks". There was lot of excitement and I thought I was going to make it with XS. My upline encouraged me to buy and stock up cases and cases of XS and retail it.

Then came another promotion - to sponsor 2 legs every month for 3 straight months. They called this promotion 6-in-90.

Then came along the useless product called PERFECT WATER and all the false claims about it. They hyped it and made people buy cases and cases of perfect water. Kate messages from WWDB and Dean Kosage's downlines started pouring in... Fellows like Bill Hawkins passionately promoted perfect water in their CDs. After a few months the hype slowly came down. Amway had to prohibit IBOs from doing the tip tests and making all the false claims.

Then came "tap rooting" which is structurally same as "stacking" except that the IBOs are introduced to each other before getting sponsored in depth. Most IBOs actually did not follow this rule and eventually it looks like this technique did not work for majority of the IBOs as well. Because...

the latest promotion that BWW is doing is actually completely new. This is something that you have never heard of. It is to go to someone in the stores, start a conversation and slowly ask, "Hei, do you use energy drinks?" Whatever they say, your response is to ask them - "I am a distributor for the top selling online energy drink brand in the U.S. I am looking for some help to distribute my product. Are you interested in making extra income outside what you do?" If they say YES, you exchange contact information. If they say NO, then try to sell them XS on the spot and at least make a retail sale... all IBOs are now carrying a cooler with a dozen ice-cold XS cans in them! The promise is that IBOs are bringing 10 to 12 guests to open meetings every week using this approach and every IBO can have a 100 people in their team in the next 3 months!!!

Whether the IBOs profit through this approach or not, the uplines are moving lot of XS in their group and making plenty of money!

(Maybe Greg Duncan really needs some help with moving XS now, after all the financial challenges he is going through!)

No matter what new technique these guys come up with, the North America Amway business has reached a plateau for the past 7 years. They need to combine international sales with North American sales in all their annual reports to make it look like the North American business is growing.

Quixtar started out as one of the top 5 retailers in early 2000s and is falling down every year - they are down to rank 35 last year.

Sugeet Smooth Liar Ajmani

There is a diamond in Kumar team named Sugeet Ajmani. Very nice guy, very entertaining guy and very funny too!

I attended his seminar in San Jose. He made 2 statements that made me feel sick at that time! Now I realize how smooth and how clever these guys are at lies!

(1) Sugeet Ajmani told

"Guy A and guy B join the business today. 'Guy A' makes $50/month one year from now and 'guy B' makes $5000/month one year from now. What is the difference? They both look alike. They both have similar jobs, similar education, similar family life and everything else is similar, except their businesses. What is the difference?"

Many people agree that 'guy B' did not work as hard as 'guy A'.

My income was more like A's income, but I had worked my BUTT off for several years for making the pathetic income I did. At that time, I thought I had not worked hard. But now I realize that there is no 'guy B' in Amway. He does not exist.

If I recall, the entire seminar had about 1000 people. A good 30% of the room was all new people. There were about 20 or 25 platinums, including fake dinosaur platinums. Maybe 2 or 3 guys were making more than $5000/month and they have been in Amway for more than 15 years or so!

(2)

The 2nd comment he made really made me mad! Sugeet Ajmani told

"There are 3 kinds of prospects. Just 3.

A, B, C.

A is 10% of the people. You call them for anything, they will come. You call them for business, they will join you. Very easy people. Anybody can sign them up.

B is 80% of the people. Skeptical, but nice people. They give you a hard time, but they either sign up or not, depending upon how you handle them. It depends on whether you are doing the 9 core steps, 5 night a week, 3 powers and board in the bedroom.

C is 10% people. They will not join anything with anybody. You need to be careful and just run away from them."

He made nice drawings for these 3 types of people on the board.

Let us assume that the ratios are correct. I did not even want to sign up any B's. I was thinking "forget about the B and C people. Where are the A people? I have been showing 10 to 15 plans every month for the last 3 years; I have only 1 leg with 1 IBO out of all those plans."

The correct ratio as far as Amway is concerned is like this:

A - 1%

B - 2%

C - 97%

Simple question: has Sugeet signed up the A's and B's in his business? Is he signing up 90% of the people he shows the plan to?

The answer is a BIG NOOOO!

Lovely, logical, appealing and very smooth lies and deception.

Translations of lies to truth

If you have been to any pin recognition in Amway meetings, then you hear the new pin winners talk passionately about how they achieved their goal the previous month or previous fiscal year. You will usually know the pin winner's numbers by watching how many people are cheering for them when they go up on stage. (To convince others that the new pin winner has lot of group, everyone in the meeting, including cross lines, are urged to scream and cheer for the new pin winners.)

You will typically hear these statements:

• We just followed what our uplines recommended us.
• We made a decision to get it done and it happened.
• Miracles happened in our business and we got it done.
• We made a promise to our uplines and got it done.
• We saw our childrens' sad faces and did it for them.
• We loved our upline so much that we got it done for them.
• We love our downlines so much that we wanted to set the right example for them.

Do you know HOW most people who make such statements reached that new pin then? The truth, the transalation of all the above statements in most cases is:

We purchased more than 50% of the products ourselves and/or forced our down lines to buy extra products and somehow qualified for the new pin at the last minute!

How do I know? Because I qualified every pin from 600 PV, all the way to platinum, exactly this way. But when I went on stage, I made those wise statements that sounded cool. All the guys in my uplines' team, including my upline, qualified this way and made similar statements.

These guys are professional liars who teach others how to become professional liars, who in turn teach others to become professional liars!

Amway professional sales (lie) training

A wonderful book that my upline recommended me was "Confident conversations - easy answers to 38 tough questions" by Brad DeHaven. Cost: $12.95 and of course, I bought from upline, not from Amazon, so paid the full money!

I loved this book when I was in Amway/BWW. But now I am ashamed that I used all the manipulation techniques this book taught. (Of course, I did not succeed even with the tricks taught in this book.)

Some questions and answers this book has. The questions are the ones coming from prospects and answers are taught to IBOs.

The 1st technique is answer a question with a question. The second is easy answer, followed by a question. (I don't have the patience to type everything, but manipulation and dodging is professionally taught to IBOs.)

Qn 1: "What is it?"

Qn for qn: "It is private franchizing. Are you familiar with it?"

Easy answer: It is a brand new industry designed specifically for the internet. I am part of a group of entrepreneurs who are very successful. Are you familiar with internet-based businesses?

(Only the new untrained guys will say it is Amway out of fear and not knowing what to say.)

Qn 2: Can you tell me more about it?

Qn for qn: "Absolutely! I would like to meet you and share this info. I have Tue or Thu free. Which works better?"

The book says they key is to start your answer with "absolutely", so the prospect thinks you are agreeing with him. But actually the IBO want to meet with the prospect in person!

Amway trains you to always tell two YES options, never YES/NO. They ask "Tue or Thu?" and never "do you want to meet me?"

Qn 3: Is this Amway?

Qn for qn: No, this is not Amway, but what is your understanding of companies like Amway?

All IBOs are trained to answer this question with a NO.

In my experience for about 5 years with Amway, all the people who asked this question were negative and never sat for plan. So no matter what you say after this really does not matter. (They have smelt the Amway in you!)

Qn 4: Is this an MLM deal/pyramid?

Qn for qn: What is your experience with MLM/pyramid?

(Again, they r taught never to say YES/NO. The IBOs are taught to ask questions to prospects, so they never answer prospect's questions.)

My experience - they have smelt you!

Qn: What are my odds of making it with this biz?

Qn for qn: What are your odds of making it without it?

I love this one -

Statement from prospect: I am not interested.

Qn from IBO: thank you for being honest. Which part are you not interested in?

qn: How much money are you making?

Qn for qn: How much money would you like to make?

(Truth is the IBO is not making much... hehe.)

Prospect: I have seen this before.

Qn: What exactly did you see before?

This is nice:

Prospect: Do I have to sell?

IBO: Do you like to sell?

Prospect: Yes/No.

IBO: Great! You will love this business. You need to meet this person at the business presentation who made it in this business and he is exactly like you.

Prospect: Do I have to buy 100 PV every month?

IBO: Do you want to make a PV check every month?

(100 PV costs about $300. PV check for that will be about $7. So the IBO is asking you, essentially, do you want to spend $300 to make $7.)

Prospect: I have always shopped at Costco/Walmart. How does this compare?

IBO: Does Costco/walmrt offer an opportunity to make money?

(Truth - Amway products are very expensive compared to Costco/walmart.)

Tip in the book: What you promote is what your prospect will investigate.

(These days there is so much crap about all the big pins that most IBOs cannot promote the open meeting speakers! :-).)

Another technique in the book to handle any question: I know how you feel. I felt the same way. Let me tell you what I found out. (and then fart whatever you want :-).)

The IBOs will always try to leave some information behind with you, so that they can force their way into your house one more time for a follow up. If you say you are not interested in the biz, they will try to sell you some products or get some of your friends' names and numbers. So if you do not take the information packet, they really have no chance with you.

Lie - anybody can go diamond

Usually the BWW diamonds make a statement like this from stage:

"We believe in you. You can go diamond. Come join us!"

and if you ask them in person, they will tell

"Absolutely, you can go diamond. I believe anybody can go diamond."

The truth as told by Sugeet Ajmani in a leadership event was this:

"80-20 rule applies to everything.

You put 10 names in your list; only 2 sit for plan. 8 will never see the plan from you.

You show 10 plans; only 2 sign up. (that too if you show it to the "right" ppl) 8 will never sign up.

You sign up 10 people; only 2 will do something. 8 will never do anything.

You have 10 people in your group; only 2 will get results. 8 will never get results.

You have 10 people getting some results, only 2 will go platinum. 8 will never go platinum.

Out of 10 platinums, only 2 will go emerald. 8 will remain platinums forever.

Out of 10 emeralds, only 2 will go diamond. 8 will remain emeralds forever.

This matches very well with the success ratio that Amway tells, something like 0.00012% of the people reaching the diamond level. Sugeet, Kumar and all the other fellows - please tell this truth to all your prospects and IBOs. Please put this statement on every CD BWW makes. The truth was finally accepted by a BWW Diamond!