The first time I saw what I refer to as the “Magic Circles”, was in 1977 in the meeting room of a local small town restaurant with one of the superstars of the World Wide Dream Builders.  While I was intrigued with the concept, it was several years until I decided to join this company and try my hand at starting my own home-based business.  Subsequently, I would drop out and restart this process with the same company a total of three times, in addition to the other companies that I attempted to work with.

I became intrigued with the various manifestations of Multi-Level Marketing, including a very enthusiastic albeit short-lived endeavor in the “binary system” with the now defunct Jewelway International.  I had become a frustrated proponent of MLM businesses.  I believed it was a great method for moving product in the market place, but I also quickly learned that there were many things about being self-employed that I was not yet prepared for. We are rewarded in life in direct proportion to our ability to overcome obstacles.  The bigger the obstacle, the greater the reward.

The first advantage of MLM businesses that we want to discuss is the relatively low startup cost.  This is both one of it’s greatest merits as well as one of it’s greatest pitfalls.  All that is really necessary to start a profitable turn-key business is a nominal financial investment, a consuming desire to succeed, the ability to follow an established system that others have perfected through trial and error, and most importantly the willingness to learn new attitudes and methods and give up old attitudes and methods that to date have not produced the desired success.

The low start up cost allows people to treat their new business as a hobby or novelty magic set instead of a business.  In my estimation, MLM businesses allow people the opportunity to put up or shut up.  Rather than sitting back and criticizing how a business is run, the new entrepreneur has the opportunity to put their business acumen to the test.  As a tradition, MLM’s have a 90% failure rate primarily because people are not willing to change their failed plans and exchange them for methods of proven success.

Humans are the most adaptable creatures on the earth, and entrepreneurs are the most adaptable humans.  Successful entrepreneurs are those people that are willing to do what unsuccessful people are unwilling to do.  The low start up cost is a great tool to evaluate if you have the skills necessary to succeed, and if not, what must you do to gain those skills.  The average millionaire in America fails in ten businesses, so if you’ve flopped, as I have in one or two businesses, or perhaps just felt that you were not being justly compensated for your efforts and decided to hang that business up, join the ranks of the success pursuers.  If you believe in the industry, adjust your methods, find a great company to work with, and engage the learning process.