Guide
Before You Join an MLM
Slow the decision down. Ask for written answers. Read the income disclosure before you spend money.
Ask for the current income disclosure
Ask whether the disclosure shows gross income or net income after expenses. If it reports only payments from the company, it may not include costs such as product, samples, training, travel, events, software, shipping, taxes, or unsold inventory.
Ask what happens to people at your starting level
Averages can be pulled upward by a small number of high earners. Ask for medians, percentiles, the percentage earning nothing, and the percentage earning less than common first-year expenses.
Ask what is optional in writing and expected in practice
Some costs may be described as optional but treated as normal for people pursuing the opportunity. Ask about starter kits, monthly purchases, autoship, events, paid training, leads, sample products, websites, and business tools.
Ask who buys the product
Ask whether compensation is tied to verified retail sales to customers who are not participants, purchases by participants, recruitment, rank maintenance, or some combination of these.
Ask for a clean exit path
Before joining, get the refund, cancellation, inventory buyback, subscription, and chargeback rules in writing. Keep copies of every document and message.
If a phrase is still stuck in your head
The phrase library explains common recruiting language such as financial freedom, passive income, and warm market.
Before you pay anything
Use the Before You Pay checklist before paying fees, buying product, subscribing to tools, attending events, or starting licensing steps.