Welcome to the Watch Next podcast. So excited to be back and I am actually recording from my phone. I've got a new set out because I'm actually, I'll be traveling to Puerto Rico at the end of the week and I'll be there for a couple weeks and I don't wanna carry all my podcast equipment, so we're gonna try to do this a little bit different. I bought myself a little level, your mic, a little TikTok mic and I get to use it. And I am very excited because this allows me to share some content with you in re, like as I. As I record live. Live. So today's episode, it is so fucking exciting because I have been having a hyper fixation for the past three years and is actually watching anti MLM complimentary content in YouTube. I don't know about you, but I just love a good get rich quick scheme. I've. I felt prey upon many years ago. I've actually fell into different cults and I'll talk about those different cults every so often. And as I create list of cults that are related to it. But I have to tell you, anti online content is such a comfort watch to listen to because it just, it's a, provides a commentary about what's happening in the US right now where we're. So caught up in this idea that we can be rich, we can be happy, we can be healthy, we can be doing this, and all these promises are happening and it all happens in a pockets over time. And that you can make money selling for your phone and you can do this and you can do that, and it's exhausting. And what you find out is that most MLMs people lose money. Whether they're buying all the products, whether they're product hoarding, whether they're actually like trying to. Scam other people so they can earn some money from the other person. Essentially, it's a pyramid scheme where the top people, the Tippe toppy, which is like less than 1%, are hoarding all the money and they're getting money from all the other people who are putting in, essentially, it's kinda like a Ponzi scheme, and we'll talk about like how this all came about from these Booker recommendations. If you're actually interested in this topic, I encourage you to check Hannah Alonzo or Hannah Thaler in Instagram and YouTube. She's a popular Instagram, a popular YouTuber. She does now does a lot of influencer content, but she's great about talking about the TMLM content. She has deep dives and her. Tone is soothing and educational, so it's just someone to listen to. If you want a little bit snarky, CC Suarez Old School episodes are great. She has moved away from it, done commentary about like latest influencers and tiktoks, but her old school commentary. About WFABB and Monet. I'll just tell you my favorite MLM to follow has been the downfall of Monet because Monet went, actually run is a shampoo dealer and they were really, high in the 2020s. 'cause it was obviously, people were like scrambling for jobs. They got the stimulus package and they started doing the selling, quote unquote selling shampoo and people were losing money. And it's been a downfall ever since. There's also lawsuits about hair loss and like infertility and ingredients are not supposed to, and we've seen some of those issues. Actually, I read, I'm reading another book about the wellness trend about a beauty product. And it's similar issues that you see in Monet are actually showing me up in fiction, which is great. But that's a little tangent, so you may find your. If you're not sure what MLMs are, it's multilevel marketing, also called social selling, social mark social marketing, where essentially distributors, it's not direct to consumer, so they don't sell. They may not sell in a store, but they sell to distributors who are the middlemen who. Then sell it to you. And the selling the products is a very minimum amount of mo of profit that they earn. The majority of the profit they earn is by recruiting other people into the business. And what happens is that once you recruited to the business, once you hit a certain mark, you're in market saturated because you all selling the same thing to everyone. And the reality is, except for MLM products, the majority of people who consume it are actually the recruiters are the product. Are the MLM members. Right now it's in a decline. A lot of m LMS have moved away from the MLM model, so that's been Beachbody, who now is Body, who now is a affiliated model. And that was a, that was, if you look at that the snark crew about it, the found downfall has been interesting because they have moved on to a lot of those top distributors have moved on to different wellness and spaces, and it's been. Chaotic mess because they're competing. Madera actually just closed down, shut down, like quickly, didn't announce it. And two weeks later a new MLM called Nueva moved on and then other people who were Madera were scrambling to go to another MLM. Last summer, rode on a field, actually ended up actually moving to the Philly model. Beautycounter actually, I think they sold off, they ended up going somewhere else and they're, they. Shut down. Saints also shut down. That was a big emblem in TikTok space, so a lot of them are moving away. But I don't know, with the recession coming in and we're in inflation and the need to make money mul schemes are happening, whether it's the MRRR, which is a mar master research resale. Which it's basically you create a course and then you sell the course, and then the other person sell the course and sell the course. And it's the same idea. You have the right to sell the course, and then the market's gonna get saturated. So. You'll see this idea like, I made $10,000, I've made a million dollars in a month for my phone. And then you just you get that promise and then you realize oh no, I'm not making any of that money. So it is just fascinating. If you're interested in this kind of content and you wanna chat with it, shoot me an email at laura@whatreadexblog.com or. Find me on a DM wherever I am, Instagram substack and whatnot. I love chatting with this content. I love chatting about this content. I love talking about it. I love understanding I, there's actually gonna be a creator, an anti creator who's gonna come be a guest. Because a big part of MLM culture is about reading personal development. It's the idea of actually improving yourself and mindset and like having the idea to do this. And a lot of it is like it's bullshit. Like it's just not, it just makes you feel like shitty and then you just don't do anything. So one of the recovery aspects of it, for me, I was not an MLMI was actually involved in the life coaching. Wellness space, and I think I shared this a little bit about it in the wellness episode with Amy Larocca That was like my go-to and I joined multiple organizations and groups and courses and everything. And I've been in debt and that's not something I meant. But for me, my way to skate was actually reading romance. It was actually reading books. It was having someone coming on my. Self-help group, like self-help podcast and talk about adult reading. And I was like, wait, I can read and then reading and just, that was my escape. Bethany is gonna be coming to the show in next few weeks or whenever we record, and she's an anti content creator. She actually was in Beachbody or Bodi for about seven years and she has a great commentary channel. I love listening to her. And so she's actually found the same thing. Found like reading actually non self-help books and reading romance and reading smut and reading all the other things actually gave her an escape. So. There's a purpose why this episode is here because. Reading can be an escape from things that are actually not doing so well. But if you're curious about this topic, I have some nonfiction and I have some fiction books that touch base on the MLM space. A lot of them are from moms, but there's actually, there's one, it's not a mom. So, so we got a little bit of everything, but we got romances, we got cozy mysteries 'cause we might as well kill them off. And then we got some nonfiction that actually are interested and read like fiction. And I think they're. They're great on audio. So let's go with the fiction first, and let's go with the romance, which is the one that just came out, which is How To Sell A Romance by Alexa Martin. This is a teacher this is a teacher, like teacher A, a single dad romance. So our protagonist basically is roped in by her principal to join an alum. She invites her, she was bored. She invites her to a conference convention as one does to our beauty company. And the principal told her, I was like, I know you need extra money because teachers don't make a lot of money, and I think this would be a great opportunity. You can actually have all this money in the world. And she basically uses her emergency savings fund to join MLM. In the conference. And so she's sitting in the bar, she's decompressing and meets the sky, and then they go upstairs, have a fun night. And then she realized, he's an investigative journalist who's investigating this MLM for the deceptive practices. And she's shocked and she's angry because she just paid money to join this organization. And they were like, he's basically had idea, like they're all sheep and they're all like, not there. They're incompetent. They don't have no idea what they're doing. And she's like very offended. And lo and behold, a couple weeks later he, his daughter is in her class, she's a kindergarten teacher, and they reconnect. And it turns out that his ex-wife was a higher up in the MLM business and is actually around related to the team that she's joined. And so we hear like the specific things and then she started awakening about the issues with the MLM Con. Issues where deceptive practices, people like putting themselves, like competing for market partners or recruiting people without the consent and actually getting stealing things and just the way they approach it. And then also like medical claims they say it's beauty brand, and you do all these different things. Perfect. And then lo and behold, they go to your dermatologist and get. Botox, they get laser peels and all these different things to look beautiful so they can sell the product because the product doesn't work. A lot of times the am LM products are overpriced, not because they work, but because they're actually like they have to pay all the recruiters, they have to pay all the layers of people, so that's why they're overpriced. If you are looking for Emma, if you like. Some MLM products and you will like some es there's some accounts and I'll be more than happy to share a couple accounts that actually share some Es but you can clearly, you can go to Google and say I want this run on feel. I've done this before. 'cause my mom bought some MLM product and it was like, look for the product and write put the product name and write dupe. And then you'll be able to find on Google, like which ones have been considered dupe. And they're probably cheaper and they're probably accessible and they're probably better than an MLM product. So just an FYI. So how to sell romances. She ended up taking down the organization and it was a sweet romances and I could not care less about the romances. The romances was okay. It was a little spicy. I talked to my friend Amy, and she says to it's good, but the MLM was like. The fun part, like the fun parts, the female relationships that happen, the conversations that occur, the way to kind of like deceptive practices and the scheming and the ways to get out and break everything down and like turn, turn the world upside down. It felt like a really, someone who has read a, who has listened to a lot of commentary, who understands like the issues and it was great. So I like the MLM part. The romance is okay, but then again this is maybe just me. I am not. Loving romance at the moment. So I'm loving more plot driven. People un alive and they like, that kind of romancw, that kind of books. So I'm like, I'm liking mysteries better than romance. So that's probably me saying, but it does have spice. So if you're looking for that, if you're looking for Romans, how to sell Romans by l Martins for you. All right, so we're gonna move to the Cozy Mysteries because there's quite a few. So the first one that I wanna talk about Is The Game Is afoot by Elyse Bryant. This the second book in a series. This is a PTA series. Our Ma Mavis. Is our main our amateur sleuth. She's a mom. She is a single mom who's over work and she's under pay and she's she's not happy with her job. She works in nonprofit, she's been handling and to do DA actions and everything. And this is the second book in the series. The first book in the series is delightful. It's called, it's elementary, but Mavis. And now there's a murder in the school and she has to solve it and she gets money and then she, now it's a second book. She's okay, I wanna get a promotion. I wanna be doing this. And her daughter's so lovely. She's seven. She's like very like percussions. And she's like joining all these different things. So Mavis is using our own money. To sign her daughter to all the activities from theater, soccer and whatnot. And she's like scheduling everything and doing everything, and she doesn't get the promotion. She's fuck, what am I gonna do? So she ended up quitting and. There's a murder and she has to solve it again. But there's this one We have an MLM, a little bit different of an so this one is self-care, MLM, with a cancer kind of like apple cider vinegar. If you haven't watched a series, is great about cancer wellness influencers. Similar idea. This person is pretending to have cancer and they have a self-care community. And it's kinda like an MLM space where people have to recruit people to get to the space for self-care. And it's just delightful. It's a delightful way to be like what is going on? What is happening here? So this is a very subtle MLM content. It, I think it's like a mixes ma more into the life coaching space, which I am much more familiar. So it marries the mar life coaching space, but the recruiting aspect, which is the Poncy Sea pyramid scheme, where it's like. You gotta recruit recruit. So the top person gets the most amount of money and the lower bottom gets, loses money. It's fun. It's a delightful Elyse Bryant can do no wrong. I love her mysteries. I can't wait. If you have a chance to listen to a mystery, the author, the narrator does such a great job doing the different voices and making sure it's, it feels very immersive. So go for the audiobook, but it's elementary. The first book, the games, the third, the second book. Both are delightful and they're awesome. Okay, now we're gonna go to another MLM. This, I think is a one and done. I don't think this is a series. It just came out in January. That should Death in the Downline by Maria Abrams. This one is a little bit interesting. I think they're all in an MLM. If I remember correctly, they're all NMLM and there's a murder and she's trying to get out of the MLM 'cause she's been like, she's been losing money and she has to solve the murder. And it's someone in the murder, in the down line. The first half reads second, someone who is in m lm, it reads like the conferences, the. The money the, so the, all the social media, they have to do all the personal development, they have to do all the expenses they have to make and the complete expenses. And so it felt very like MLM Pro, MLM and then there was like murder. And you're like, oh, okay, maybe this is anti MLM. So, so it's delightful. I don't know if there's gonna be more books in the series, but this one's a good one. It's a short audiobook. You can listen to it. I think you might be able to find it from the library. It's a fun one to listen to and whatnot. Okay, so the next book I have not read, but it's available on Kindle Unlimited Read and listen. So I did borrow it and I'm hoping to listen to it. Or if you borrow it, you can get the audiobook for 1 99. And it's homemaker by Ruthie Knox and an Annie Mayor. They actually have written a couple other cozy mysteries, and I read the one in Hollywood and it was delightful. So I'm really excited. I think this one has MLM elements with it. I have not read it. But it's about moms, looking for a job. For a psychic, it's, there's no accident that a lot of the MLMs are founded in Utah, where there's a whole hub of a high population of hormones who are stay at home moms, who are raising their children, who also need to make a lot of, they need, they wanna contribute to the household and they wanna have money. And so a lot of m LMS tend to work that crowd. And so that's the other book that I wanna share. Okay. So we're gonna talk some nonfiction that reads like fiction. These are actually like audiobooks and I'm gonna go with the easiest audiobooks to listen to and to the more what you consider more dense. So the first one I wanna talk about is Hey Hun by Emily Lynn Paulson. Emily is an anti creator. She has, she was a higher up in. An ML m's company, and she basically just write her escape and writes about basically a commentary about the MLM space what happened, how she, it affected her alcoholism and how it affected her space, like her relationships, her friendships, her money, and how did she get out? It reads like fiction. It's. Very engaging. The audiobook is excellent. I think this is a great one. If you wanna get to the inside knowledge about conventions and like how to target in teams and everything. And if you're familiar with the Rod on Fields and you'll understand some of the players, you might be able to like, oh, I know who you're talking about, kind of deal. 'Cause there's some players who become MLM coaches. Yes. There's actually MLM coaches, they actually moved to digital sales because MLM is falling. So they're not moving to another scheme. But there are people who have built, build a business of a business kind of deal. So that's Hey Hun by Emily Lynn Paulson. Lyn has done various podcasts. You have an opportunity to listen to her talk about it. She does a lot of commentary in her website and especially when Lins start falling and stuff like that. Letting them know, educating the members. So that's Hey Hun by Emily Lynn Paulson. The next book that I wanna talk about is. Selling The Dream by Jane Marie. So Jade Marie actually has a podcast, it's called The Dream. There's various seasons. The first season is about MLM. Second season is about life coaches, and then there's another season about MLM. And there's some big players that you probably are from. You may, if you're familiar with the MLM space, you may be familiar with just Lily Ward who was a top top distributor for Prove I, which is a ketone. You'll be like, what the fuck are you talking about? Yes. I, ketones, I don't know what ketones are. Supposedly they fat burning thing and somehow they make you lose weight. So Jesse Lee Ward was higher up in the pyramid scheme. She was very cold, like very, she considered herself the richest person and the one who's big top distributor. Top this, and there's quite a few conversations about ACT practices that she did when she was alive. Unfortunately, just the war was diagnosed with stage four colon cancer and she passed away. So, she chose not to go undergo traditional treatment and try to do. The apple cider vinegar treatment if and so yeah, so that's, so she doesn't do readjust Jesse Lee Ward actually live tapes I interview. She doesn't realize that, that someone is anti MLM. So it's fascinating. If Jesse Lee Ward, she actually has a red, there's a Reddit about her. That's how not influential. That's how, that's how well known she was in the space. So yeah, so this is an interesting, so you have the podcast, but she actually does, she named Marie published a book about the pyramid schemes and stuff like that. So that's an audiobook that you can listen to and it's great and you have the podcast companion to do it. The final book that I wanna talk about it, and it's one that's a little, it's considered a little bit dense, but I find it so fascinating if you're interested, not just in MLM space, but in the personal development space and the idea of the manifestation, the, mindset and all this different thing is Little Bosses Everywhere by Bridget Reed, I listen to this audiobook, she goes back to the history and I'm telling you the history, it didn't start. With Amway, it doesn't start with Mary Kay. It's like going back from the beginning, from the biggest, the first failure to where we are now. It is. It can be dense. As someone who enjoys nonfiction audio books, I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed understanding what happened and specific things, and so all the Amos come from this plan. There's actually like a plan that was created that they have blueprint that they have. Basically copy each other and have moved on and have Excel and have grown and everything. And you see the impact of MLMs everywhere. Like it really comes down to it's so insidious. Like no matter what, you try to get one down 21 come in. And it is it's just like this place where it's just like it's happening everywhere. As someone who does work in the fraud space, I do work in the fraud space. It's. It's daunting. It's daunting. If you think about the impact you're gonna make, that you're gonna try to eliminate fraud, that doesn't happen. You're just like, you're basically Whacka bill, you're like one down 21 come down and then another one down and another one comes out. Like you're always trying to just manage to go ahead of the scheme. And I think that's why I am so fascinated with this particular topic is because. It's just so ripe and it's so. Deceptive. An idea of you're promising a dream. I know you're telling 'em like you can do this and pockets of time how they sell it. You can do this in pockets of time. And then you realize it's like how much work you're doing for no money, and it's just. Frustrating because not just no money, you're paying other people. You're paying for products, you're paying for conventions, you're paying for trips. There's no such thing as a free trip. I know they sell like you're gonna go to Miami, you're gonna go to San Domingo, but you are tax for those trips. You're also a 10 99 contractor. So. All the work you're doing, you may not get paid for it. You're not getting benefits, you're not getting 401k, you're not getting healthcare benefits, you're not getting retirement, you're not getting any of the stuff. You're just like working for free. And, sometimes it's fine to work for free. Obviously I have a podcast and I work for free you guys, but there's a level of I'm not. I'm spending the money where I only want to do it and it is okay. So I think it's just fascinating. But that's the episode. So if you enjoy this, if you enjoyed this podcast, please consider rate, review or subscribe. Thank you so much for listening and I hope you have a great day. Bye.