Lead funnels sold to network marketers: the full research

The research was done by AI agents that open web pages. Some sites refuse them; where that happened we say so. The small numbers point to the source list at the end. Where a figure is our own sum or guess, it is marked “our estimate” and the basis is given.

The claim

Our collection for this scheme holds only 3 tweets, from 2 accounts¹. Both accounts have fewer than 10,000 followers (1,550 and 4,239), so under our naming rule we do not name them or quote them word for word¹. The page therefore rests on how the method is promoted generally, and judges the scheme, not the people who tweeted.

What the three tweets say, in our words¹:

One account twice posted the same offer: leads at no charge for anyone who duplicates its set-up, with a link.
The other account greets a new follower and then says that duplicating its set-up brings in cash in the hundreds of dollars every day, for little effort, from home. The text is cut off in our copy and ends in a link.

The tweets date from 2017. That date is worked out from the tweets’ ID numbers; we did not open them on X¹. No view counts were recorded, and the three tweets have 0, 0 and 3 likes¹. So this is a small, old sample. We did not check how common this exact pitch is on X in 2026.

The only figures in the tweet text are cash in the hundreds of dollars a day and leads at no charge; both phrases are our words, not the tweets’¹. The text gives no price, no commission, no number of leads, no share of leads who pay, no advertising cost and no hours¹. We read the text only; any images, videos or threads attached to the tweets were not viewed.

What the scheme is

Network marketing, also called multi-level marketing or MLM, is selling a company’s products as an independent seller and being paid both on your own sales and on the sales of people you recruit. The people you recruit, and the people they recruit, are your “downline”. The person who recruited you is your “upline”.

A lead is the contact details of someone who might buy or join. A funnel is a chain of web pages and emails that turns a stranger into a lead and then, the seller hopes, into a paying customer or recruit. The first page is often a “squeeze page”: a page with almost nothing on it except a promise and a box for your email address. An “autoresponder” is a tool that then sends that address a series of emails automatically.

A “copy my system” funnel is a ready-made version of all this, rented to network marketers and to people looking for work at home. You pay a fee, get a copy of the pages and emails with your own member number in the links, and send people to it. In many of these systems, what the funnel mainly sells is membership of the funnel itself, and you are paid a commission when someone you sent joins and pays. A person paid a commission for sending buyers is called an affiliate.

We followed the links in the collected tweets to see what they pointed to.

The link in two of the tweets led to a referral address at a site called LeadSkimmer, carrying a member number². An archived copy from March 2017 shows it forwarding to a second site, which was a video and an email form². The page’s description, the summary a page gives to search engines and link previews, read “The #1 way to build your OWN contact lists - 3X as fast - and skyrocket your income - 3X as fast - as you could ever do on your own!”². It showed no price, commission or lead numbers before asking for an email address².
The site’s own disclaimer, archived in 2017, said: “ANY AND ALL CLAIMS OR REPRESENTATIONS, AS TO INCOME EARNINGS ON THIS WEB SITE, ARE NOT TO BE CONSIDERED AS AVERAGE EARNINGS. TESTIMONIALS ARE NOT REPRESENTATIVE.”³
The link in the third tweet led to a different site. Its January 2017 archived copy is an email form titled “Accelerated Success” that promises “100% Instant Commissions” and a free video, and shows “Only 22 spots left”⁴. The page’s own code counts that number down on timers in the visitor’s browser and stores it in a cookie; it is not tied to any real stock⁴. The page names no product or company and gives no price⁴.

None of these sites exists today. The three related addresses we checked no longer resolve, meaning a browser cannot find them at all²⁴. One of our researchers reported that no archived copy of the LeadSkimmer page existed; others opened archived copies and quoted them. The archive refused one of our reviewers; the copies of the second site, its disclaimer and the third tweet’s page were opened again when the page was edited and the quotes matched.

The arithmetic

The tweets give an income and nothing to check it with. So the sums below are built from outside sources.

One limit applies to everything that follows. No source compares sellers who use a funnel with sellers who do not. The figures here are for network marketing as a whole; the funnel adds a cost to it, and we found no evidence that it changes the odds either way.

Step 1: what hundreds of dollars a day means in a year

$100 a day is $36,500 a year, or about $3,000 a month (our sum: 100 x 365). “Hundreds” means at least $200 a day, which is $73,000 a year or about $6,000 a month (our sum).

Step 2: what a network marketer normally receives

These funnels are sold to network marketers, so the first question is what the business underneath pays.

In the United States, many network marketing companies publish an “income disclosure statement”: a table of what their sellers were paid. Staff of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the US consumer protection regulator, reviewed 70 of these statements. They found that “many participants in those MLMs received no payments from the MLMs, and the vast majority received $1,000 or less per year—that is, less than $84 per month, on average.”⁵

Step 3: the sales it would take

The industry’s own trade body gives a second way to check. Its 2025 fact sheet says: “By dividing the $34.2 billion in sales by the 5.2 million direct sellers in 2025, direct sellers averaged $6,577 in retail sales in 2025.”⁷ That is sales, not income, and it is about $548 a month (our sum).

One company statement reproduced in the FTC report gives a sales commission range of 15% to 40%⁵. The table shows how much a seller would have to sell personally, at three rates in that range, compared with the average seller (our estimate, from⁵ and⁷).

Income wanted	Sales needed a year at 15%	at 25%	at 40%	Times the average seller’s $6,577
$1,000 a month	$80,000	$48,000	$30,000	5 to 12 times
$3,000 a month ($100 a day)	$240,000	$144,000	$90,000	14 to 36 times
$6,000 a month ($200 a day)	$480,000	$288,000	$180,000	27 to 73 times
$10,000 a month	$800,000	$480,000	$300,000	46 to 122 times

Nobody sells that much alone. The plan is to recruit a downline that does. That is the demand these funnels serve. The average is also pulled up by the biggest sellers, so the typical seller sells less than $6,577.

Step 4: the referrals it would take

In the other version of the scheme, the funnel sells its own membership and pays you per member. Here a current seller’s pages give some numbers. The Home Business Academy’s income page headlines “The Turnkey Residual Income System Where 80% of Every Dollar Comes Back to You” and adds “Fewer customers. Bigger checks.”¹⁵ Its checkout charges $25 a month for the funnel builder and offers two extras: one at $10 a month and “Premium” at $125 a month after a 14-day free trial¹⁵.

Neither page says which fees the 80% is paid on, and we did not read the affiliate agreement. So the table gives two cases, both our estimate. If the 80% applies to the $25 fee, a referred member is worth about $20 a month (80% of $25). If it also applies to Premium, a member who buys everything is worth about $120 to $128 a month (80% of $150 to $160).

Income wanted	Paying members needed at $20 each a month (our estimate, from¹⁵)	Needed at $120 each, if every member also pays for Premium (our estimate, from¹⁵)
$1,000 a month	50	9
$3,000 a month ($100 a day)	150	25
$6,000 a month ($200 a day)	300	50
$10,000 a month	500	84

The share of members who pay for Premium is not published, so the true figure lies somewhere between the columns. We also do not know whether a referrer must buy Premium to be paid on it.

These are members who are paying at the same time, every month. People who cancel have to be replaced. We found no figure for how long funnel members stay. In network marketing generally, the FTC alleged in its 2016 Herbalife case that nearly half of that company’s sellers quit in any given year⁴¹ (the case was settled that year with a $200 million payment and a restructuring; it concerns only that company), and in a survey of 601 people who had taken part in network marketing, 44% took part for less than a year⁴³. If half of a funnel’s members left each year, holding 150 would mean finding about 75 new paying members a year just to stand still (our estimate).

The income page carries this line, which is the seller’s own legal disclaimer: “*Required Legal Disclaimer: Typical affiliates earn no income. This is not a get-rich-quick program. No sales = no income.”¹⁵

Step 5: what a lead costs

The tweets say the leads cost nothing¹. That can be true in money. Leads can come from a seller’s own posts, short videos and messages to people they know, and the systems teach this: the Home Business Academy’s Premium extra includes a tool that “scripts, records, and publishes your videos”¹⁵. The cost is hours. No source we found measures how many hours, or how many leads they bring, and the platform rules described below limit automated and repeated posting. So leads at no charge are real but slow, and their yield is as unmeasured as that of paid ones.

Where leads are bought, the sellers’ and marketplaces’ own pages give prices.

Bought clicks. A “solo ad” is a paid email sent to someone else’s mailing list, priced per click. On Udimi, a large marketplace for solo ads, the 25 sellers listed first under “marketing” charged $0.40 to $2.00 a click, with a middle price (median) of $0.55⁸. Several of them list network marketing, work-from-home and business-opportunity offers as what they send⁸. These 25 are the ones shown first, not a random sample. Udimi refused our tools directly; a reader service fetched the page.
Clicks into leads. Unbounce, which sells landing page software, reports from its own data: “The median conversion rate across all industries is 6.6%.”⁹ At that rate one lead costs about $8.33 (our estimate: $0.55 divided by 6.6%). Guides to solo ads claim 10% to 30% for squeeze pages, but those are blog posts we did not open; at 30% a lead would cost about $1.83 (our estimate). The Unbounce figure is not specific to business-opportunity pages.
Facebook ads. WordStream’s 2026 benchmark, published in September 2026, says: “The 2026 average cost per lead in Facebook ads for leads campaigns across all industries is $27.39.”¹⁰ The nearest category, career and employment, was the cheapest at $12.30¹⁰. At those prices 100 leads cost about $1,230 to $2,740 (our estimate).
Bought lists. Apache Leads, which sells leads to network marketers, lists 25 US phone-interviewed leads at $99 ($79.20 on offer, “$3.17 Per Lead”), with larger packs down to $1.32 a lead¹¹. The page gives no figure for how many leads join anything¹¹.

So a bought lead costs somewhere between about $1.30 and $27, depending on where it comes from⁸¹⁰¹¹.

Step 6: leads into paying members

This is the step no source measures. We found no published figure for how many leads from a funnel like this become paying members or recruits.

As an illustration only, and for paid advertising only (our estimate): suppose 1 to 3 in every 100 leads pays. With solo-ad leads at $1.83 to $8.33, one paying member then costs between about $61 and $833 in clicks. A middle case ($0.55 a click, 15 leads per 100 clicks, 2 payers per 100 leads) gives about $183 per paying member. Finding 150 members at that price is about $27,500 of advertising, and 300 is about $55,000. A seller who finds members through their own posts and contacts spends hours instead, and we have no figure for those. The 1 to 3 in 100 is our assumption, not a measurement. If the true rate is much higher, the sums look better; we found nobody who has published it.

Step 7: the fixed costs

A person who builds their own funnel pays for tools every month. On the vendors’ own pricing pages, ClickFunnels starts at $97 a month¹², GoHighLevel at $97 a month¹³, and AWeber, an email tool, at $15 to $30 a month for 500 contacts¹⁴. One funnel tool at $97 plus the email tool at $15 to $30 is about $112 to $127 a month, or roughly $1,300 to $1,500 a year (our sum). The ClickFunnels price was seen by one researcher only; the page showed no prices to two others, including when this page was edited.

That fixed cost alone is more than the $1,000 a year that the vast majority of participants receive in the FTC staff review⁵. A rented system is cheaper: $25 a month at the Home Business Academy, plus the optional extras described in Step 4¹⁵.

What people who tried it report

We looked for an ordinary buyer of one of these funnels who had published earnings with proof, such as payment records. We found none. Every success story we met came from someone selling the system or earning commission on it. That is an absence after a limited search, and Reddit refused our tools, so forum threads were not read.

What exists instead is three kinds of evidence.

The sellers’ own income tables. Empower Network was a blogging and recruiting system sold to network marketers in the years just before the collected tweets. An archived copy of its income page, covering January 2013 to November 2014, shows²⁵:

91% of all affiliates received under $100 a month, with an average of $5 a month, before costs.
“The average affiliate spends between $500 and $3,000 in expenses as they build their business. Less than 4% earns sufficient commissions to cover their costs of the Empower Network products.”
Among affiliates who earned any commission in a month, 60% received under $100, averaging $33.
Under 1% were in the top band of $25,000 or more a month, where the average was $57,469.

These are the company’s own unaudited figures, before costs. Truth in Advertising, a consumer watchdog, compared the company’s fees of about $2,000 a year with an earlier version of the table and wrote that when “two-thirds of distributors earn less than $500 on average per year, you realize that most folks lose money.”²⁶ We did not find a reply from the company. Its founder said in August 2017 that the company had no money and was going bankrupt, as reported by the trade-watch site BehindMLM; we did not find a court record²⁷.

Regulator cases. These are the expensive end of the same idea: programmes sold as ready-made systems, costing from $1,000 to as much as $60,000²⁹³⁵³⁸. In our search we found no regulator case against a lead tool priced at $7 to $25 a month, and none against the lower-priced tools named elsewhere on this page. These cases concern only the companies named in them, and say nothing about any account in our tweet collection.

MOBE (2018). The FTC alleged a $49 entry programme led to memberships costing thousands and that more than $125 million was taken³⁰. Its release says: “The defendants eventually reveal that their “proven system” for making money is for consumers to sell the same memberships to others in the hopes of earning commissions on those sales. Most people who buy into the program and pay for the expensive memberships are unable to recoup their costs”³⁰. These were allegations when filed; the case ended in settlements. In 2022 the FTC sent more than $23 million to more than 37,000 people: “The average payment amount is just over $633.”³¹ That is under a fifth of the amount alleged (our sum). BehindMLM, summarising the court filings, put the cost of climbing every membership level at about $60,000²⁹; we did not open the filings.
Digital Altitude (2018). The FTC alleged the company took more than $14 million and “offered their marketing materials for consumers to use in posting their own ads touting the scheme”, and that most customers never earned substantial income, “including some people who were charged more than $50,000.”³³ We did not check how the case ended. In 2021 the FTC sent refunds “averaging about $456 each, to 10,249 people”³⁴.
Digital Income System (2020 to 2022). The FTC alleged that memberships cost $1,000 to $25,000 and came with a ready-made website for reselling them³⁵³⁷. The FTC wrote that “the vast majority of consumers who paid the defendants never earned substantial income, and in fact many consumers earned nothing, the FTC alleged.”³⁵ The company and three people settled; a court entered default judgments (judgments given when a defendant does not answer) against two more³⁵. Refunds were 1,064 cheques totalling more than $542,000, about $509 each (our sum)³⁶.
Blueprint to Wealth (2023 to 2025). The FTC’s complaint said “consumers were charged at least $3,000 and as much as $21,000” for turnkey online businesses “operated on the members’ behalf”³⁸. The cases were settled. Refunds in September 2025 were $666,631 to 4,208 people, about $158 each (our sum)³⁸.
8 Figure Dream Lifestyle (2019 to 2021). The FTC alleged buyers “rarely earned substantial income” and “typically lost their entire investment”; $1.1 million was returned³⁹.

Surveys of network marketing in general. The AARP Foundation surveyed a nationally representative group of 601 people who had taken part in network marketing. “Nearly half (47%) of MLM participants reported that they lost money.”⁴³ 27% broke even and about a quarter made a profit⁴³. Most reported losses were small against the sums in the regulator cases: “41% lost less than $5,000, 3% lost between $5,000 and $9,999, and 1% lost more than $10,000”⁴³. The answers are the participants’ own and the study dates from 2018. A separate 2018 survey of 1,049 participants, which we read only as cited in the FTC report, found 57.2% earned under $500 in five years before expenses, and median earnings of $0.67 an hour⁵.

Systems that closed and systems that lasted. Several of the best-known systems have closed. This is not a sample or a failure rate: some are on our list because a court halted them. MOBE and Digital Altitude were halted by court order³⁰³³. Empower Network’s founder said it was going bankrupt²⁷. The address of My Lead System Pro shows “myleadsystempro.com is for sale — Buy for $15,000 or Lease to Own”²². Legendary Marketer, which sold affiliate marketing courses and was not a network marketing lead system, shows only “Thank You For 9 Unforgettable Years!”²³. Others have lasted. The Home Business Academy’s page shows “10 YRS Track Record”¹⁵, and Power Lead System’s chief executive calls it “a company I founded 12 years ago”⁶⁵. Six more vendors named on this page loaded on 10 October 2026¹¹¹⁶¹⁷¹⁸¹⁹²⁰. We did not establish when or why My Lead System Pro and Legendary Marketer stopped, or whether either trades under another address. The practical point is narrow: monthly commissions from a rented system end if the system does.

What the rules allow now

What is allowed. Selling or using lead pages, email tools and training for a network marketing business is legal in the United States. Network marketing itself is legal where pay depends on real sales to customers. The FTC’s guidance treats tools, services and training as ordinary business expenses of a participant⁴⁴. Companies can also win in court: a law firm’s summary reports that in September 2023 a federal judge in Texas ruled for the company Neora on all the FTC’s claims⁵³. We did not open the court’s opinion.

The income promise. The FTC’s guidance for the industry says: “Any earnings claim should reflect what the typical person to whom the representation is directed is likely to achieve.”⁴⁴ It adds that a line such as “results not typical” is not enough to fix a misleading claim⁴⁴. By that standard, a promise of hundreds of dollars a day would need to match typical results, and the typical result in the FTC staff review is under $84 a month⁵. The guidance also says participants typically act as agents of the company, so a seller’s own claims can create liability for the company⁴⁴. The FTC’s page for consumers puts it shortly: “Most people who join legitimate MLMs make little or no money. Some of them lose money.”⁴⁵

Individuals can be held responsible, not only companies. In the MOBE case the FTC also reached settlements with large affiliates who had built their own branded programmes to promote it. The release is titled “Affiliate Marketers to Pay More Than $4 Million to Settle Charges that They Promoted a Fraudulent Business Coaching and Investment Scheme”³². The settlement orders carried judgments from $1.8 million to $31.6 million. Most were suspended in whole or in part on grounds of inability to pay, meaning the rest is not collected unless the person is found to have misstated their finances; one, of $3.35 million, was payable in full³². Each defendant was permanently banned from selling money-making methods³². These were charges settled by agreement, not findings after a trial. In the AdvoCare case, two top promoters accepted a ban from network marketing and a $4 million judgment, suspended when they handed over assets⁴⁰.

A 2026 case shows the same thing for an income promise. In April 2026 the FTC alleged that two senior participants in the company LifeWave told recruits they could make $25,000 or more a week⁴². According to the complaint, the company’s own 2024 statement said that “79% of active participants earned nothing in commission payments in 2024” and that at most 0.035% earned that much⁴². That is about 1 in 2,900 (our sum). These are allegations against those two people, not against LifeWave, which was not a defendant. The two agreed to a settlement order, which was awaiting a judge’s signature when the release was published⁴².

These were large promoters. We found no case against a small individual seller for using a funnel. Each case concerns only the people and companies named in it.

Rules on the paperwork. The existing US Business Opportunity Rule can apply when a seller takes a payment and promises to provide customers or internet outlets; a covered seller must give the buyer a written disclosure at least seven days before payment⁴⁹. Whether a particular lead system is covered is a legal question we did not resolve. In 2021 the FTC told more than 1,100 businesses that pitch money-making ventures that deceptive earnings claims could bring penalties of up to $43,792 per violation at the time (the amount is adjusted for inflation each year); being on that list is not a finding of wrongdoing⁴⁶. In January 2025 the FTC proposed, by a 3 to 2 vote, a new rule on earnings claims in network marketing and a wider Business Opportunity Rule⁴⁷. The FTC’s regulatory agenda of August 2026 still calls the earnings rule “proposed”⁴⁸. So the stricter rule is not in force as far as we could tell. The FTC is still bringing cases over “done-for-you” business offers under the existing rules: in May 2025 an order against Ecommerce Empire Builders, a seller of ready-made online stores and not a network marketing funnel, banned it from selling business opportunities and carried a judgment of $9,786,124, partly suspended⁵⁰. That case concerns only the company and owner named in it.

Email and other countries. The follow-up emails at the heart of a funnel fall under the US CAN-SPAM Act: the FTC’s guide gives penalties of up to $53,088 for each email that breaks it, and says both the sender and the company being promoted can be liable⁵¹. A list of people who asked for the emails, with a working way to unsubscribe, is allowed. In Canada, promoting a pyramid selling scheme is a criminal offence, with fines of up to C$200,000 per count or up to one year in prison on summary conviction, the less serious of the two ways the offence can be tried⁵².

Platform rules.

X. X’s automation rules do not allow automated replies or mentions to people who have not asked for them, and say that someone following your account is not enough on its own to show they want an automated response⁵⁴. They also bar bulk or automated unsolicited direct messages and posting the same content repeatedly⁵⁴. X’s spam policy says severe violations bring permanent suspension at first detection⁵⁵. X does not ban network marketing content as such⁵⁵. The two identical tweets in our collection were posted about four months apart in 2017, and we cannot tell whether the tweet greeting a new follower was automated¹. We draw no conclusion about whether any of them broke X’s rules, then or now.
TikTok. The community guidelines version in force from May 2024 lists recruiting for multi-level marketing among things not allowed⁵⁶. We could not read the 2026 wording. TikTok’s ads policy, updated September 2026, does not allow “Get-rich-quick offers” or pyramid schemes, and lists multi-level marketing as not allowed in many markets⁵⁷.
Meta (Facebook and Instagram). The community standards prohibit “Offers of opportunities of unrealistic financial reward for unclear or minimal effort.”⁵⁸ Meta’s advertising rules are reported to require income-opportunity ads to describe the business model fully; we could not open that page⁵⁹.
Google Ads. The policy does not allow claims that present an improbable result as the likely outcome, even if the result is possible⁶⁰.

In short: the tool is allowed. The promise in the tweets, as worded, is what the rules are aimed at. A suspended account also takes with it the audience a funnel depends on.

Who makes money from it

Following the money on the sellers’ own pages, read on 10 October 2026:

The person who referred you. The Home Business Academy advertises 80% commissions and charges $25 a month for its funnel builder¹⁵. If the 80% applies to that fee, a referrer receives about $20 a month per member (our estimate; we did not read the affiliate agreement). MLM Recruit On Demand charges $15 once for leads, scripts and a contact manager, and explains its no-refund rule this way: “Our affiliate (the person that referred you to this site) is paid instantly when you make your payment.”¹⁷ MLM Gateway, a free-to-join site that reports 382,179 registered members, pays affiliates 35% to 50% of what the people they refer spend there¹⁸. Master Affiliate Profits pays free members 25% on purchases by people they refer, and 40%, 50%, 75% or 100% to members on its paid Silver, Gold, Platinum and VIP levels¹⁶. So on that system the commission rate rises as the member pays for a higher level. We did not find the prices of those levels.
The system’s owner. The owner keeps whatever is not paid out in commission. We found no figure for any owner’s revenue or profit, and several owners’ systems closed, as described above. BehindMLM, a critical reviewer, wrote that members of Lead Lightning, a product of Power Lead System, “join for $7 and are then bombarded with upsells ranging in price from $29.97 a month to $497 one-time”²⁸. An upsell is a dearer product offered straight after a purchase. Those prices are historical. We did not find the company’s reply, and its site today presents a service for booking sales appointments and shows no member prices⁶⁵.
Sellers of leads and clicks. Apache Leads and the solo-ad sellers on Udimi are paid up front, per lead or per click, whether or not anyone joins⁸¹¹.
Tool companies. ClickFunnels, GoHighLevel and AWeber are paid monthly whether or not the funnel recruits anyone¹²¹³¹⁴. A book page by ClickFunnels’ co-founder, which links to ClickFunnels’ terms, pitches funnels to network marketers and says: “We make no earnings claims or return on investment claims, and you may not make your money back.”²¹
Training and coaching brands. AttractionMarketing.com promotes its system with the line “How Average Networkers are Passively Attracting Prospects & Growing Teams of 1,000, 2,000 or Even 3,000+ People in 12 Months or Less”¹⁹. Its home page shows no price and no typical-result figure¹⁹. RapidFunnel sells a team-wide system to network marketing leaders; its basic app is free to each seller and a paid upgrade includes 25 leads a month²⁰.
Top affiliates with their own audience. In a 2012 investigation by The Verge, a seller of online marketing courses said 90% of the sales in one of his product launches came from seven of his affiliates⁶⁴. He was not selling a network marketing system, the statement is his own and it is old. We offer it only as a sign of how concentrated affiliate sales can be.

In the version where the funnel sells its own membership, the newcomer earns only when other newcomers pay. The payments that do not depend on anyone joining go to the sellers of leads and clicks and to the tool companies. The owner and the referrer are paid when a newcomer pays.

The upside

Some people are paid at the level the tweets name. The evidence for it comes from company tables, which are unaudited and before expenses. None of it shows that a copied funnel is what got anyone there.

The best documented outcomes

Herbalife, 2025, United States (company’s own statement). About 107,769 distributors ordered products for resale, about 96,000 of them earned money in the year, and about 47,000 earned in a typical month⁶¹. Among the roughly 41,000 of those past their first year: “Top 10% (about 4,100) earned more than $5,442 in a month” and “Top 1% (about 410) earned more than $21,893 in a month”⁶¹. About 4,100 is 3.8% of the 107,769, and 410 is 0.4% (our sums)⁶¹. These are amounts for a month in which the person earned, not steady monthly pay: the statement says of this group “about half earned in seven months or more in 2025”⁶¹. It adds: “In 2025, the tenure of the Top 1% typically ranged from five to 12 years.”⁶¹
Amway, 2025, United States (company’s own disclosure). Amway ranks its sellers, whom it calls IBOs, by sales volume. The Founders Platinum rank averaged $48,879 a year before expenses, about $134 a day (our sum), was held by 0.54% of its sellers, and took 3 to 12 years to reach⁶². That is about 1 in 185 (our sum). Higher ranks exist, but the disclosure gives no figures for them: “A small number of IBOs achieve higher levels of recognition and earnings.”⁶² “The average annual earnings in 2025 for all U.S. IBOs at the Founders Platinum level and below were $750 before expenses.”⁶² Amway refused our tools directly; a reader service fetched the page.
One rank table in the FTC report (2021, company name removed). The largest group, 54.6% of those paid a commission, averaged $42 a month. The first rank averaging over $1,000 a month averaged $2,519 and was held by 2.5%. A rank averaging $39,886 a month was held by under 1%, and the two highest ranks in the same table averaged roughly $160,000 and $280,000 a month, each also held by under 1%⁵. About 25% of all members received nothing⁵. The table was read from an image in the report, so single digits may be misread.
Empower Network, 2013 to 2014 (company’s own table). Under 1% of affiliates who earned anything were in the band of $25,000 or more a month, averaging $57,469²⁵.
Legendary Marketer (company’s own claim, as reported by NBC in 2024). NBC reported that the company’s site stated $250 million in career sales, with well over half paid to affiliates, and that it sold a $7 challenge leading to a $2,500 course²⁴. The same report says the site told buyers “the average person” should expect “little to no results”, and that the chief executive said he takes feedback seriously and was working with the Better Business Bureau²⁴. The total is the company’s own figure and says nothing about how it was shared out.
The AARP survey (participants’ own answers). A quarter reported a profit. Over their whole time in the business, 14% of all participants made under $5,000, 6% made $5,000 to $9,999, 3% made $10,000 to $24,999 and 3% made $25,000 or more⁴³. “Only three individuals, half of one percent, reported profits of $100,000 or more. All of these three individuals worked as direct sellers for the company for more than 5 years”⁴³. The three “put in between 10 to 40 hours of work per week”, and one of them had founded the organisation⁴³.

The top tenth and the top hundredth

The Herbalife figures above are the clearest: more than $5,442 in a month for the top tenth of established earners and more than $21,893 for the top hundredth, before expenses, in the months when they earned⁶¹. Among Amway sellers who received any payment in 2025, the top tenth had a median of $4,854 for the year (about $400 a month, our sum) and an average of $15,691; the top half had a median of $551 for the year (about $46 a month, our sum) and an average of $3,598⁶². The averages are pulled up by the largest earners. 38% of all US Amway sellers had no sales, recruited nobody and were paid nothing⁶².

A realistic good result in the first year or two (our estimate)

Herbalife publishes first-year figures. Of about 6,000 first-year distributors who earned in a typical month, half earned more than $166 in that month, the top tenth (about 600) more than $1,174, and the top hundredth (about 60) more than $5,552, before expenses⁶¹. These are not steady monthly incomes: the statement says of this group “about half earned in two months or more in 2025”⁶¹. It does not say how many first-year distributors earned nothing.

So a competent newcomer who ends up among those who earn might see roughly $170 to $1,200, before costs, in a month in which they earn, and many earn in only a few months of the year (our estimate, from⁶¹). On that basis the year’s total for the middle first-year earner may be a few hundred dollars (our estimate). Amway gives no first-year figures; its nearest figure, the $551-a-year median above, points the same way⁶². A funnel adds costs: tools at $25 to about $127 a month and, where leads are bought, $1.30 to $27 each⁸¹⁰¹¹¹²¹⁴¹⁵. At the lower end of that income range, the costs can be larger than the income.

As for the tweets’ figure: in the companies that publish figures, $130 to $180 a day is reached by under 1% of sellers at Amway (after 3 to 12 years) and by about 4% at Herbalife, in months when they earn⁶¹⁶². $200 a day or more is rarer still. Herbalife’s top 1% of established earners, at more than $720 a day (our sum), typically had five to 12 years’ tenure⁶¹.

What it takes to compete

What the people who succeed have

Years. Five to 12 years for Herbalife’s top 1%⁶¹; 3 to 12 years for Amway’s Founders Platinum⁶²; more than five years for every $100,000 earner in the AARP survey⁴³.
An early or top position. One of the three biggest earners in the AARP survey founded the organisation⁴³.
Probably an audience or mailing list of their own (our inference). This rests on one 2012 statement from outside network marketing: a course seller said seven affiliates made 90% of a launch’s sales⁶⁴. Herbalife and Amway do not say how their top earners find recruits⁶¹⁶². A newcomer with no list either buys clicks or spends months building an audience.
Selling experience is rare at the start. In the AARP survey, 75% of participants had no earlier experience of commission sales⁴³. We found no data on whether having it predicts profit.
A product that sells to real customers. Pay that depends on real retail sales is what keeps a company on the legal side of the line⁴⁴⁴⁵.
Steady hours, from part-time to full-time. The three $100,000 earners in the AARP survey worked 10 to 40 hours a week⁴³. Primerica, an insurance sales company, says its senior leaders “open and operate offices for their sales organizations and devote their full-time attention to their businesses.”⁶³ The trade body counts 0.4 million full-time sellers (30 or more hours a week) out of 5.2 million⁷.

More hours alone do not separate the two groups. The AARP study found that profits rose with hours worked, and so did losses, to about the same degree⁴³.

The one use this evidence does not touch. A seller who already has real customers can rent a page-and-email tool for $25 a month to sell product to them¹⁵. The test there is simple and quick: within a few months, do the added sales cover the fee? Nothing we read measures this case, in either direction.

The pool is also shrinking: the trade body’s fact sheet reports 5.2 million US sellers in 2025, down 4% on 2024⁷.

What it costs

Tools and leads, at the prices in Steps 5 and 7: $25 to about $127 a month for the funnel¹²¹⁴¹⁵, and $1.30 to $27 for each bought lead⁸¹⁰¹¹. Leads from your own posting cost hours, not money.
A realistic advertising test: 100 Facebook leads cost about $1,230 to $2,740 (our estimate, from¹⁰). In our paid-advertising illustration in Step 6, reaching 150 paying members costs about $27,500 (our estimate, resting on an assumed rate).
The company’s own costs on top. In the AdvoCare case the FTC alleged that it cost $59 to join and typically $1,200 to $2,400 in product to reach the “advisor” level, and that 72.3% of distributors received no compensation in 2016⁴⁰. Those are allegations from the complaint; the case was settled and concerns only that company.

How to tell early which side you are on

Ask the person offering the system for last year’s income after expenses, including the system’s fee and advertising, and how many of their recruits left. The FTC’s guidance says claims should reflect typical results and that tools and training are expenses⁴⁴. Someone who can show this is the checkable case.
Read the system’s own disclaimer and income page before paying. The ones we read say that figures are not average³, that typical affiliates earn nothing¹⁵, or that you may not make your money back²¹.
Look at what the funnel sells. If the main product is membership of the funnel, your income depends on other newcomers paying. That is the pattern in the four business-opportunity cases above, which were far dearer programmes than a $25 tool³⁰³³³⁵³⁸.
Count paying members, not leads, after the first few hundred leads. If a few hundred leads have produced no paying member, the sums in Steps 4 to 6 will not close at any budget you would want to spend (our estimate).
Check that you can leave with your list. If the leads live on the vendor’s system and the vendor closes, the leads go too. Some well-known systems have closed, and others have run for ten years or more¹⁵²²²³⁶⁵.
Watch for a countdown of “spots left”. On the one archived page we examined, the page’s own code generated the number⁴.

What we did not verify

The sample is 3 tweets from 2017 with no view counts. We did not open them on X, and did not check whether this pitch is still common on X in 2026 or whether the two accounts are still active.
The share of funnel leads who become paying members or recruits. No measured figure was found. The 1 to 3 in 100 used in Step 6 is our assumption.
Solo-ad sign-up rates of 10% to 30% come from summaries of blog posts we did not open. The 6.6% figure is not specific to this kind of page.
What LeadSkimmer charged or paid, who ran it, and which programme the second landing page promoted. The archived copy of the referral address itself, and its forwarding to the second site, were read by the drafting researchers only.
Any payment-verified income report from a user of one of these funnels. None was found.
Income tables for My Lead System Pro, Elite Marketing Pro, Legendary Marketer, Power Lead System and Master Affiliate Profits. The pages were blocked, empty or gone, directly and through a reader service.
Level prices at Master Affiliate Profits; the paid upgrade price at RapidFunnel; credit prices at MLM Gateway; refund terms at Apache Leads; the Home Business Academy’s full affiliate agreement, including which fees its 80% is paid on and whether a referrer must buy a product to be paid on it. The ClickFunnels starting price of $97 was seen by one researcher and could not be confirmed again.
When and why My Lead System Pro and Legendary Marketer stopped, and whether either has moved. Whether Empower Network entered bankruptcy: we have only its founder’s statement as reported, not a court record.
Any owner’s revenue or profit from a lead system. None was found.
Whether sellers who use a funnel do better or worse than those who do not, and the yield of unpaid leads from a seller’s own posting.
The court filings and final judgments in the MOBE, Digital Altitude and Digital Income System cases, and how the Digital Altitude case ended. We read the FTC’s press releases. The complaint against the two LifeWave participants could not be downloaded.
Whether the FTC’s January 2025 proposals were published in the Federal Register, finalised or withdrawn. The current inflation-adjusted penalty amounts were not checked.
Whether the FTC appealed the Neora ruling; the ruling itself was not opened.
Meta’s advertising rule on income opportunities, TikTok’s 2026 community guidelines wording, and any platform figures on enforcement.
Rules on phoning or texting bought leads, tax treatment, US state laws, and rules outside the United States and Canada.
Whether individual network marketing companies forbid their sellers from using outside lead systems.
Hours: the only figure is the 10 to 40 hours a week of three top earners in the AARP survey. No source gives the time spent by people who reach $1,000 or $10,000 a month with these systems.
Company figures from Herbalife and Amway are before expenses and unaudited. Neither says how its top earners find recruits. Herbalife does not say how many first-year distributors earned nothing, and Amway gives no figures above its Founders Platinum rank.
Some quotations reached us through a fetch tool that passes the page through a summarising model, not as raw page text: those from the FTC’s guidance for the industry⁴⁴, the pricing pages¹²¹³¹⁴, Unbounce⁹, NBC²⁴ and the platform policy pages⁵⁴⁵⁵⁵⁶⁵⁷⁵⁸⁶⁰. They should be re-opened before being relied on as exact wording.

Sources

“Read at source” means we opened the page itself on 10 October 2026. “Secondary” means we read an article or summary about the source, not the source itself. “Estimate” means our own sum. “Through a reader service” means a service fetched the page for us because the site refused our tools directly. “Archived copy” means a copy kept by the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.

Does It Pay collection of 3 tweets on this scheme, collected 2026-10-06. Tweets dated 2017 from their ID numbers (estimate). Read from our collected copy on 2026-10-10, not from the live tweets. Individual tweets are not linked because the accounts are below our naming threshold.
LeadSkimmer referral page, archived copy of 2017-03-11, and the page it forwarded to (skim3.com), archived copy of 2017-08-30. http://web.archive.org/web/20170830162036/http://skim3.com/ . The referral address itself is withheld because it carries a member number. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copies); the live addresses did not resolve on 2026-10-10. The quoted line is the page’s description text.
skim3.com earnings disclaimer, archived copy of 2017-12-17. http://web.archive.org/web/20171217032035/http://skim3.com/disclaimer.php . Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy).
moneysolutions.be, “Accelerated Success” page, archived copy of 2017-01-27. http://web.archive.org/web/20170127190434/http://www.moneysolutions.be:80/ . Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy); the live address did not resolve.
FTC staff, “Multi-Level Marketing Income Disclosure Statements” staff report. https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/mlm-ids-report.pdf (also at https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/2024-08-19-mlm-ids-staff-report.pdf ). 2024-09-04. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service (PDF text; both addresses refused a direct fetch). The 2018 survey of 1,049 participants is secondary: read only as cited in a footnote of this report.
FTC business blog, “FTC staff report analyzes 70 MLM income disclosure statements”. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2024/09/ftc-staff-report-analyzes-70-mlm-income-disclosure-statements . 2024-09-04. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
Direct Selling Education Foundation and Direct Selling Association, 2026 Growth and Outlook fact sheet (2025 data). https://dsef.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/dsa-2025-g-o-factsheet.pdf . August 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
Udimi, solo-ad sellers in the “marketing” niche. https://udimi.com/buy-solo-ads/niche/marketing . 2026-10-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service. Median of the first 25 listings is our sum.
Unbounce, Conversion Benchmark Report. https://unbounce.com/conversion-benchmark-report/ . 2024 edition, no exact date. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
WordStream, “Facebook Ads Benchmarks 2026”. https://www.wordstream.com/blog/facebook-ads-benchmarks-2026 . 2026-09-14. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
Apache Leads, phone-interviewed real-time leads. https://apacheleads.com/mlm-leads/phone-interviewed-real-time-live/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
ClickFunnels pricing. https://www.clickfunnels.com/pricing . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10 by one researcher; the page showed no prices through a reader service.
GoHighLevel pricing. https://www.gohighlevel.com/pricing . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
AWeber pricing. https://www.aweber.com/pricing.htm . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
The Home Business Academy, income page and checkout. https://thehomebusinessacademy.com/income and https://thehba.app/checkout/funnel-builder . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
Master Affiliate Profits, legal page. https://masteraffiliateprofits.com/legal/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
MLM Recruit On Demand, FAQ. https://www.mlmrecruitondemand.com/faq.php?id=admin . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
MLM Gateway, affiliate terms and home page. https://www.mlmgateway.com/ga-terms.php and https://www.mlmgateway.com/ . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
AttractionMarketing.com, home page. https://attractionmarketing.com/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
RapidFunnel pricing. https://rapidfunnel.com/pricing/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
“Network Marketing Secrets” book page, by a co-founder of ClickFunnels. https://networkmarketingsecrets.com/ . Page dated 2025-09-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
myleadsystempro.com, for-sale page. https://myleadsystempro.com/ . 2026-10-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
Legendary Marketer, home page. https://legendarymarketer.com/ . 2026-10-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10, directly (a reader service was refused); every address on the site served only a one-line farewell.
NBC News, republished by NBC DFW, on advertising for a side-hustle course. https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/national-international/ads-for-a-popular-online-side-hustle-course-are-misleading-customers-say/3494838/ . 2024-03-21. Read at source on 2026-10-10. The company’s figures in it are the company’s own.
Empower Network income disclosure, covering 2013-01-01 to 2014-11-30, archived copy of 2014-12-31. https://web.archive.org/web/20141231151725/http://www.empowernetwork.com/income . Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy). Company’s own unaudited figures.
Truth in Advertising, “Empower Network”. https://truthinadvertising.org/articles/empower-network/ . 2014-03-22, updated 2014-06-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
BehindMLM, article reporting the Empower Network founder’s statement that the company was going bankrupt. https://behindmlm.com/companies/empower-network/empower-network-is-bankrupt-david-wood-explains-all/ . 2017-08-03. Secondary (a report of the founder’s own video statement, read through a reader service on 2026-10-10; no court record found).
BehindMLM, reviews of Lead Lightning and Power Lead System. https://behindmlm.com/mlm-reviews/lead-lightning-review-power-lead-system-rebooted/ and https://behindmlm.com/companies/power-lead-system-review-accelerated-leverage/ . Dates not pinned down (date strings of 2013, 2017 and 2020 appear on the pages). Secondary.
BehindMLM, summary of the FTC’s MOBE filings. https://behindmlm.com/companies/mobe/mobes-entire-business-model-is-a-fraud-ftcs-tro-granted/ . 2018-06-12. Secondary.
FTC, “FTC Action Halts MOBE, a Massive Internet Business Coaching Scheme”. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2018/06/ftc-action-halts-mobe-massive-internet-business-coaching-scheme . 2018-06-11. Read at source on 2026-10-10, confirmed through a reader service.
FTC, MOBE refunds. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/04/federal-trade-commission-returns-more-23-million-consumers-deceived-online-business-coaching-scheme . 2022-04-05. Read at source on 2026-10-10, confirmed through a reader service.
FTC, settlements with MOBE affiliates. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2020/03/affiliate-marketers-pay-more-4-million-settle-charges-they . 2020-03-05. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, Digital Altitude court order. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2018/02/ftc-obtains-court-order-halting-business-coaching-scheme . 2018-02-08. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
FTC, Digital Altitude refunds. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2021/02/ftc-sends-nearly-47-million-victims-digital-altitude-business-coaching-scheme . 2021-02-03. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
FTC, Digital Income System settlement. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2021/07/operators-business-opportunity-scheme-falsely-promised-big . 2021-07-02. Read at source on 2026-10-10, confirmed through a reader service.
FTC, Digital Income System refunds. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/06/federal-trade-commission-returns-more-542000-consumers-harmed-bogus-money-making-scheme-digital . 2022-06-01. Read at source on 2026-10-10. Per-cheque average is our sum.
FTC, Operation Income Illusion. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2020/12/scammers-leverage-pandemic-fears-ftc-law-enforcement-partners . 2020-12-14. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, Blueprint to Wealth complaint and refunds. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/12/ftc-acts-stop-sprawling-business-opportunity-scheme-took-millions-consumers (2023-12-19) and https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2025/09/ftc-sends-money-consumers-harmed-deceptive-business-opportunity-scheme-known-blueprint-wealth (2025-09-16). Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service. Per-person average is our sum.
FTC, 8 Figure Dream Lifestyle refunds. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2021/10/ftc-returns-11-million-consumers-who-lost-money-alleged-scammers-selling-bogus-income-opportunities . 2021-10-04. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
FTC, AdvoCare settlement. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2019/10/multi-level-marketer-advocare-will-pay-150-million-settle-ftc-charges-it-operated-illegal-pyramid . 2019-10-02. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, Herbalife settlement. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2016/07/herbalife-will-restructure-its-multi-level-marketing-operations-pay-200-million-consumer-redress . 2016-07-15. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, action against two senior participants in LifeWave (the company was not a defendant). https://www.ftc.gov/node/331308 . 2026-04-27. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service (press release only).
AARP Foundation, “Multilevel Marketing: The Research, Risks and Rewards”. https://www.aarp.org/content/dam/aarp/aarp_foundation/2018/pdf/AARP%20Foundation%20MLM%20Research%20Study%20Report%2010.8.18.pdf . 2018 (file dated 2018-10-08). Read at source on 2026-10-10 (PDF text).
FTC, “Business Guidance Concerning Multi-Level Marketing”. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/business-guidance-concerning-multi-level-marketing . April 2024. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC consumer advice, “Multi-Level Marketing Businesses and Pyramid Schemes”. https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/multi-level-marketing-businesses-pyramid-schemes . July 2022. Read at source on 2026-10-10, confirmed through a reader service.
FTC, notice on money-making claims. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2021/10/ftc-puts-businesses-notice-false-money-making-claims-could-lead-big-penalties . 2021-10-26. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, proposed rule changes on earnings claims. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2025/01/ftc-proposes-rule-changes-new-rule-deter-deceptive-earnings-claims-multilevel-marketers-money-making . 2025-01-13. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
Federal Register, FTC regulatory agenda. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/08/14/2026-16617/regulatory-agenda . 2026-08-14. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
Business Opportunity Rule, 16 CFR Part 437. https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-16/chapter-I/subchapter-D/part-437 . Current text. Read at source on 2026-10-10. FTC guidance on the rule: https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/selling-work-home-or-other-business-opportunity-revised-rule-may-apply-you , 2022-11-16.
FTC, Ecommerce Empire Builders order. https://www.ftc.gov/node/88217 . 2025-05-09. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
FTC, “CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business”. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/can-spam-act-compliance-guide-business . August 2023, penalty figure edited January 2024. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
Competition Bureau Canada, multi-level marketing and pyramid selling. https://competition-bureau.canada.ca/en/deceptive-marketing-practices/types-deceptive-marketing-practices/multi-level-marketing-and-pyramid-selling . 2024-10-15. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
Kelley Drye, “Neora Prevails in Landmark Decision for Direct Selling Industry”. https://www.kelleydrye.com/viewpoints/blogs/ad-law-access/neora-prevails-in-landmark-decision-for-direct-selling-industry . 2023-09-29. Secondary (a law firm’s summary of the ruling).
X Help, automation rules. https://help.x.com/en/rules-and-policies/x-automation . Updated April 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2026-10-01; the live page refused our tools).
X Help, platform manipulation and spam policy. https://help.x.com/en/rules-and-policies/platform-manipulation . April 2025. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2026-10-07).
TikTok community guidelines, regulated commercial activities. https://www.tiktok.com/community-guidelines/en/regulated-commercial-activities . Effective 2024-05-17. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2024-12-31; later versions returned no text).
TikTok ads policy, financial services. https://ads.tiktok.com/help/article/tiktok-ads-policy-financial-services . Updated September 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2026-09-15).
Meta community standards, fraud and scams. https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/fraud-scams/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2026-10-03).
Meta advertising standards. https://transparency.meta.com/policies/ad-standards/ . 2026. Secondary (search summary only; the page could not be opened).
Google Ads policy, misrepresentation. https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/6020955?hl=en . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (archived copy of 2026-09-28).
Herbalife, “Statement of Typical Distributor Earnings”, United States, 2025 data. https://www.herbalife.com/content/dam/global-reusable-assets/documents/pd-statement-typical-distributor-earnings-en-us.pdf . June 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10. Company’s own unaudited figures.
Amway, US income disclosure, 2025 data. https://www.amway.com/en_US/income-disclosure . Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service. Company’s own unaudited figures.
Primerica, annual report and Form 10-K for 2025. https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1475922/000119312526139064/2025_ar_glossy_and_10-k.pdf . Filed 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10. The 13.6% is our sum.
The Verge, Joseph L. Flatley, investigation of online get-rich-quick marketing. https://www.theverge.com/2012/5/10/2984893/scamworld-get-rich-quick-schemes-mutate-into-an-online-monster . 2012-05-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10. The figure used is one seller’s own statement.
Power Lead System, home page. https://www.powerleadsystem.com/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.

Corrections

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