5Linx Reviews – A Proven Scam? [EXPOSED]

The company actually sell pretty much everything that they can that you would consider as an essential "must have" item that most people or business's can't function without or items that are hot, popular and trending. 

They have even entered into the CBD Oil Market. 

There problem here is they don't actually specialise in anything at all.  They are trying to target everyone and everything with a "Scatter gun" approach. 

When it comes to business, both online and offline, getting targeted and finding a focus point, a specific audience is very important. 

If you try to provide a product or service for everybody you end with nobody!. 

5Linx is a multilevel marketing business and just like every other business in the MLM sector there are two main ways of making money with 5Linx. 

1. Direct Sales: You sell products and earn a commission
2. Recruitment: You recruit others into 5linx and you earn pass up residual commissions and bonuses. 

Getting Started With 5Linx - How To Become An Independent Marketing Representative

To get started as an Independent Marketing Representative (or IMR for short) you are required pay a joining fee and get eight customer points. One of those eight points has to be from a different person. 

To Join You have 3 Possible Options: 

First Option

Pay US$199 and become an Independent Marketing Representative and then buy a platinum discount network monthly subscription of US$49.95 and includes 4 points. The remaining points you will need to sell enough products to get 4 missing point to make the 8 total and the point from one other person. 

Second Option

Agree To Pay US$499 and get 5 customer points and buy the monthly platinum discount network subscription for US$49.95 and get 10 points in total - You are then left to make a sale to get 10 points in total and the distribution of points from one other person. 

Third Option 

Fork Out US$999 to get 10 customer points, then agree to the Platinum discount network monthly subscription and get 20 total customer points. At this point you are still missing making enough sales to get at least 1 customer point and that all important other person for the points distribution obligation.

A couple things to note here. 

The obligation to have your points distributed by having at least 1 point from one other person is actually a good thing as it does appear that the company obliges you to get sales. 

Sales are the life blood of all businesses, regardless of what the business is and which business model is being used. 

However, there does appear to be no obligation of the one point from at least one other person being achieved through direct sales.

It does appear that recruitment would qualify and satisfy this obligation. 

The other point. 

If you are to join 5Linx or any other MLM, you should not feel nor be pressured by your sponsor to start at a higher pricing point than you feel comfortable with. 

Remember, it is in your sponsor's best interest that you buy a more expensive starter pack due to a greater commission being obtained. If the system works, then it works no matter what starter pack you buy!.  

The 5Linx Compensation Plan Explained

It comes as no great surprise to me that the 5Linx compensation plan is pretty complex. This is what I expected - it is very rare to find a a network marketing company that does not have a mind melting complicated compensation plan. 

I am able to clarify 2 key points. The compensation plan has 8 different ranks. This is not something that I like to see at all.

Too many chef's spoil the broth!. 

Or as it is in network marketing too many ranks spoil a products pricing structure. Think about it.

The commissions are getting paid on 8 levels, to 8 people. This all add to a product being over priced and when a consumer can get a similar product for a better price they will not buy from you. 

Many experts in the MLM industry say the maximum number of ranks should be 5 - known as the rule of 5!. 

My Other point...

The average actual commission for products sold weighs in at....50cents.

When you work out the product prices and the compensation plan and its functionality when you watch the video below you will be able to calculate out what your commission will be. 

...And that the whole plan is heavily weighted to those at the very top!.

I always check out how a company is seen and rated by consumer groups and organisations.

This in my opinion gives me some kind of indication as how they conduct themselves as a business and how much I can trust them.

It is an indication, no more. A rough general idea of how they operate. 

5Linx are not accredited by the Better Business Bureau but do hold an A- rating. 

There is actually no shortage of complaints about 5Linxs. This is actually what I expected given that their products are over priced and the commissions are terribly low in my opinion. 

This (the complaint above) is actually a pretty solid point that has been made.

It really is not that difficult to search on amazon or perform searches on google to find products and services that are considerably cheaper than what is being sold by 5linx.

It only take a few minutes to find products of similar quality or better and much cheaper. 

Whic begs the question why would anyone want to buy from you as a 5linx agent?

The Co-founders Jeb Tyler, Craig Jerabeck and Jason Guck were indicted and later charged for multiple incidents of fraud including money laundering and wire fraud. 

The founders also admitted to committing fraud of US$2.3M from their investors, failing to pay taxes and criminally depositing monies to their personal accounts. 

Craig Jerabeck and Jeb Tyler were sentenced to serve 14 months in prison for their crimes. 

Ironically, $2.3M worth of commissions was stolen from a company that actively helps to fight crime. 

You can read about the story here and here.

What is not clear is if the company committed fraud in relation to non-payment of distributors earnings.  

But it does make the company ethos of "freedom and integrity" to come back and bite them in the backside!. 

There are some things about 5Linx that I did like, let's talk about those. 

Highly Rated By The BBB

Although not accredited by the Better Business Bureau it was pleasing to see An A- rating.

Worthy of note, the BBB rates the company not on how they perform business but how they relate to the consumer side of their business, so an A rating, even an A- is good to see. 

The Have A Lot Highly Desired/Needed Products

It is always good business to sell what people and businesses want and need. 

They Have Been In Business A Long Time

Starting a business is hard work, staying in business is even harder!. Kudos for them staying in business for so long.

Incidentally speaking 5Linx are still in business, but not experiencing anywhere near the success they have during their peak. 

There are a lot of things that I don't like about this company, time to talk about those. 

Overpriced Products

I actually put in little effort and check out some similar products on Amazon and found some products that were of better quality by known brands and cheaper. 

The Fraud Charges Of The Founders

My understanding is that 2 of the three that were charged had previous convictions and this is why they were jailed while the other wasn't. 

Those charged and the FBI arrests of 5Linx founders makes me very uncomfortable in terms of trusting the company. 

A Recruitment Focused MLM!

This is never good. If you worked out that you were going to earn pennies, like 50 cents per TeeVee subsciption or over $100 per recruit which of the two would you be more interested in - selling products and services or recruiting? 

That is what leads to the "pyramid" collapsing - no or few products being sold.

It Is Really Hard To Earn Money With 5linx

With an average earnings of 50 cents per sale, you will need to sell hundreds of products daily to earn anything remotely like a reasonable income!. 

While there is a distinct possibility of you actually earning money with 5Linx, that is something that is not in doubt. 

In my mind - never was. 

The big question is how much and how likely are you to build a solid and sustainable business with this opportunity. 

Let's study their income disclosure statement to find out. 

The rank that I have highlighted is that of national director. 

One thing to note - despite this being out of 2015, this is during the peak years of the business opportunity when money was flowing into the company and long before the FBI arrested the founders for fraud. 

105 national directors earned on average US$26,216.80 per year. Only 0.69% of representatives manages to reach this rank. 

The most common occurring income was US$433 per year. 

It is fair to say that 99.31% of all participants failed to earn a full time income from this business opportunity. It is statistically unlikely that you would be able to earn a full time liveable income. 

Do keep in mind that those figures are not the profit margin for running your business. The costs associated are not included. 

By their very nature all MLM businesses appear to look like a pyramid scheme due to the way in which they function. 

Technicalities in the law, particularly the 1979 Amway ruling mean that 5linx are a legal company and not a pyramid scheme. The main reason being that they have a set of products that are services being sold. 

Yes, 

This very clear. 5Linx is an Multilevel Marketing business opportunity, this is easily determined by the structure of the compensation plan and paying out over several levels. 

Nothing would delight me more than to say that in my opinion 5Linx is a scam. The founders may have been charged with fraud, money laundering and non payment of due taxes. 

The might not be operating a scam on the distributor/customer level but I certainly don't trust this company for a second given the very seriousness of the nature of what the owners were charged and found guilty of. 

If you get offered the possibility to join 5Linx run!. If the distributor is new - send them this article - they might still qualify for a refund if their trial period is not up!. 

MLM's are notoriously difficult. It requires a certain skill set, an ability to recruit, manage and sell products.

This is not something that you can learn in a day or two or even in a couple of weeks. It takes months to develop that skill set. 

Why get involved in something where the odds of success are highly stacked against you?.  

Official statics show that the possibility of success and obtaining a liveable income is 2%. As I pointed out with 5linxs that is 0.69%, significantly lower than average!.

I suggest that you avoid this one and MLM's altogether. It will save you from bugging the heck out of your family and friends trying to get them to join a business opportunity in which they are likely to fail at. 

I have been earning my keep online since 2015 and steering clear of MLM's, surveys and face to face selling doing something pretty simple that absolutely anyone can do. 

Read about how I Make Money Online below and click the red button for more details. 

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The reasons are pretty simple:

• No huge startup costs!
  
• No Selling face to face!
• No Stock to keep or manage!
• No huge investment involved - (Get started for $19!)
• No networking or recruiting required. 
• You can operate in any market you wish! - even your hobbies & passion!
• Earn a full time income & more!. No limit to your earning potential!. 
  

In fact...

I have created and built a regular mid 4 figure passive monthly income and fully enjoy a life of travel to where I want and when I want. With no boss to answer to and zero annoying co-workers I completely enjoy life and work when I choose to.

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