Is Saturation A Threat To Your MLM Home Business?
Sep 29th, 2008 by admin
Is saturation something you need to worry about as you look into various MLM network marketing opportunities?
Maybe. We have to ask ourselves this: Can local markets sustain an indefinitely growing number of distributors for a single MLM company? Intuitively speaking the answer would seem to be no. How big could your downline get before you were tripping all over each other, after all?
Matt Dillard, however, calls the idea of saturation in network marketing a myth. As Matt points out, some companies have been around for over 30 years. And we all know that these big companies are still recruiting. Are all these fresh recruits failing in the business?
Why is it, Matt asks, that companies still sell microwaves every day, when everybody we know already has one in the house? It’s an interesting question, although I’m not sure it corresponds very well with MLM. The thing is, MLM distributors usually get exclusive rights to their clients. This makes the potential for saturation in any market greater. If every one of those people who owned a microwave had to buy a second one or a replacement from the same person, it would be a different situation.
Matt’s most insightful observation is that saturation would actually occur if there were no attrition in the MLM industry. Attrition represents the people who join an MLM home business opportunity only to do nothing and quit. Or it represents the people who eventually slow down and stop growing their businesses.
Because of attrition, Matt insists, the number of active distributors, the ones actually working the business, remains relatively static, no matter how many people sign up.
That’s fascinating to think about. It gets back to some inescapable facts about human nature. The reality is, the great majority of people who get into an MLM business opportunity will not get it off the ground. It’s the 80/20 principle. And for various reasons, the numbers are actually more skewed than 80/20 for MLM.
That should actually be good news for anyone who has the persistence and motivation to succeed in this business.
A couple other things to think about.
All else equal, a company with fewer distributors already in place is the better opportunity. All else equal though. Don’t get sucked into a fly-by-night offer with a goofy product. It’ll disappear out from under you.
Also, the internet represents a market for MLM that some would call saturation resistant. If you hunt around online, you will undoubtedly encounter the modern message (with some strong hype about “lies”), which tells you to get off the street and get behind your computer. I don’t happen to agree with this message, but that’s a topic that’ll require some time to deal with.
