Hey there sea changers, and welcome to another of my MLM reviews. I do these to give those of you looking to fund your sea change via the MLM world an opportunity to decided which program might be suited for you in an online environment. Today we investigate a well-known MLM company my Avon MLM Review – You may have heard of it haha. I came across this in a recent post I was writing about cosmetics affiliate programs and was reminded of my mum complaining that she would love to buy more Avon products if she didn't have to sit through those “God awful parties” to get it. So what is the Avon MLM? Is it still as it was? Let's find out…
What is MLM?
Multi-level marketing (MLM) programs are the mainstay of the ‘party plan' world of products such as Tupperware, Mary Kay and Amway etc. and a traditional mainstay of cosmetics and Avon. The multi level aspects of MLM come from its hierarchical nature in which you make commissions based not only on those that you sell to, but also the sales of those whom you ‘sign' into membership arrangements as well.
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In short, the process works as follows:
- You join the program, either via referral from another person (known as your up line) or directly through their website.
- You promote and sell the products of the company via parties, workshops or online.
- As you make sales, you offer incentives to your customers to sign up as a member of the program (there are different names for this but they all mean the same thing).
- That new member is then placed ‘underneath' you in a hierarchical arrangement (known as your down line).
- You, and a number of levels of your up line, then gain extra commissions for everything they sell as well.
- If they manage to refer their customers into memberships, they also become a member of your down line allowing you to make up line commissions as well.
The number of levels of your up and down lines will vary depending on the program you have joined. Commission rates will also change as your down line grows or contracts and many will also offer other incentives such as total company sales percentages and/or access to membership prizes as your own business grows.
Who is Avon?
Avon is an extremely well-known cosmetics company who claim to have invented the art of social selling (MLM) and outline on their website the ability of its distributors to sell Avon products in your sweats or stilettos. They also pride themselves on their empowerment of female entrepreneurs. Their mission:
“To celebrate women’s power to make a beautiful and positive impact in the world“.
Avon was founded in 1886 (yep, that long ago) in New York city by David H. McConnell, a traveling salesman who found that he made more sales if he offered the lady of the house a free perfume at the time of the sales pitch. They are second only to Amway is terms of total MLM sales per annum and the 5th largest cosmetics company in the world.
What do they Sell?
Avon offers a huge array of products (way too many to list here) however they are available in the following categories:
The advantage here is that for an online business arrangement, there are just so many products that you can promote, review, compare and discuss in any number of niches including:
- Cosmetics
- Health and Wellness
- Fitness
- Men's grooming
- General well-being
- Women's health
- Luxury
- and so many more
Another thing my dear old mum used to complain about was that Avon was so expensive – so I ask my beautiful wife to check it out for me and she assures me that the pricing is no more costly than what you would find in most retail or online outlets… (sorry mum).
MLM Program outline
The Avon MLM program is known as its Representative program. The base details are as follows:
Commission rate: 20 – 40%
Down line commission rates: Up to 8% to 10 levels
Minimum monthly spend to qualify for commissions – N/A
Costs to join: $30 – but you get a gift set worth roughly $80 in return. Starter kits are available to purchase but not mandatory.
Payment terms: 2 business days from purchase for personal commissions – monthly for others
Application required?: Yes, basic personal information and email address.
Marketing materials provided: Personalised website, training videos, documents, and resources.
Click here for more information in regards to the Avon representative program
The main advantage of this program is the relatively low entry costs of just $30. This means that if you are able to sign up and make immediate sales, you can make some good money straight up without the need to be out-of-pocket. That said, like anything, if you are planning to build your knowledge of the products and promote them for sale then some I imagine that some purchases would be required.
Also, unlike most other programs, Avon do not rely on personal or group volume points for commission qualification or rankings. Their structure is based purely on sales volume meaning you can rise through the ranks on the volume that you have actually sold and not on a percentage that has been converted to a PV point.
It should be noted here however that whilst the sign up and referral qualification processes are very straight forward within the website, there is only the very basic information in regards to the representative program itself. In order to find information covering the ranking structure and commissions I had to break my ‘website only' rule and find information from other sources. So with that said, in regards to the information below, if anything I have written here is inaccurate, then I am more than happy for you to comment below.
Ranking structure
The ranking structure for Avon is quite straight forward compared to others with commission rates rising based on the sales volume and number of underlings you have within your down line. Ranking commissions are as follows:
As you can see, commissions are paid down to 10 levels based on:
- The number of orders made within your downline.
- The total sales volume of your downline.
- The number of Leaders you have within your downline.
This is quite simplistic and in line with many of the major MLM programs out there.
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How can you get paid?
As per the above chart, there a number of ways that you can earn commissions and payments with the Avon MLM program. These are as follows:
Base commissions
Commissions are paid to you for all sales made by those you have introduced to the program. These rate are actually much higher than many other MLM programs I have seen and are as follows:
Downline commissions
Once you meet the total order, sales volume and downline qualifications as outlined above, you can earn commissions ranging from 4 – 8% of your total downline sales as follows:
As you can see on the right, higher ranks also qualify for extra leadership commissions on total downline sales.
Recruitment bonus
Earn $20 for every new representative that you recruit who makes $150 worth of purchases within their first 2 campaigns.
Promotion bonus
Promotion bonuses are once off payments made once you achieve a new rank within the program. Bonuses are paid as follows:
Mentor bonus
If you are able to mentor and guide any of your down line to a rank of Ambassador or above, then you also qualify for the mentor bonus as below:
Note: I have seen mentioned in a number of areas some other bonuses, increased commissions and a car allowance for those in the higher ranks (as is common with most MLM programs) but I have not been able to find any concrete information in regards to these.
What is good about it?
So, after a good look around the site and looking at all the options I could find, I do like the following:
- The website is clean and easy to follow.
- It is simple for your downline to ‘tag' their sales to you.
- There are no minimum monthly purchase requirements.
- Commission rates for entry level sales are much higher than most other programs.
- Ranks and commission structures are calculated on actual sales volumes and not a points system.
- Well known and trusted company.
What is no so good about it?
There are also some things to be aware of including:
- Information is not as easy to find as I would have expected.
- Avon has still not completely recovered from its party plan stigma of years gone by.
- Avon's popularity can in some instances lead to over saturation in the market.
- The website provided to representatives is a stock standard one that will not generate many sales on its own.
My final thoughts
Look, MLM is not an easy platform to make money in – and please keep in mind that in most programs like this, only a small percentage make some money and less than 1% make it to the upper ranks. In regards to the Avon program, the main advantages are the fact that you do not need to make monthly purchases to qualify for commissions meaning that you can wait until you are making some money before you buy if you like. I also really like the fact that commissions and rankings are paid solely on sales volume and not some convoluted formula of assigning ‘points' to items at what is generally 50- 75% of the sale price.
There is however a massive red flag for me – this actually surprised me since Avon is proud of being the instigator of what we know as network marketing – in that the Avon Compensatin Plan is extremely hard to locate. In fact, as I stated earlier, for this post I had to break my own rule about only using information from the website and do some Google searches to find the required information on other review sites or via back end links.
Interestingly, in terms of reviews of this platform, there were way more that were positive than not – this is unusual for MLM reviews due to the difficulty that most have in making money from them. Product reviews are mixed, but nothing that is not common within this niche.
So, is Avon worth joining? Look, if you are passionate about the product, or cosmetics in general and have the drive to succeed in the very difficult arena that in MLM, then there is nothing here that I have seen that would make me warn you off of this one. If however, you are just starting out and looking to just promote the products and earn commissions without worrying too much about signing people up etc., then you may want to start by looking into affiliate marketing rather than committing to an MLM program in short term.
Conclusion
So there you have it, my honest review and appraisal of the Avon MLM program. I hope it has been of assistance but as usual, if you have any questions please do not hesitate to reach out by commenting below.
Are there any other programs you have been looking at but want to know more about? If so, please comment below and I will do my best to get some details for you.
Do you want further assistance with any of the above or need help to build your own cosmetics or MLM based website?
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Until next time
Have fun
Paul
Note: If you make a purchase from this page, there is a very good chance that I make a commission from it – these commissions do not increase your sale price.