I had a friend ask me this today and thought it might be good to post it here for you all to comment on.
Direct Sales - selling direct to the customer either via a one on one relationship or in a party plan type situation. The seller earns a commission off of the sale of product.Often Direct Sales companies (like ours) have a multi-level element to them in the career plan.
Multi-level marketing - a business where one can earn an income from those they sponsor into the business. Can be direct sales or via a network marketing channel. In a direct sales situation, like ours, the parent company pays the recruiter a percentage of the sale of product (not to recruit the person - that's not allowed) for their help in building the company and hopefully leading that person in their business. For instance, in NA, our career plan pays out for THREE levels of downline... and the percentages are based on the recruiters personal sales, recruiting activity and leadership (helping others grow their business). I've attached a copy of the career plan again in case you didn't get one earlier.
Network Marketing - Marketing your business via networking.... similar to direct sales but as I understand it usually in a real Network Marketing business, most of the reps are recruited as wholesale buyers of the product and not necessarily going to actually sell the same product to other individuals at retail price. Most of the time a Network Marketing business is multi level.. in fact I can't think of one that isn't as it wouldn't make sense not to be. Amway was the leader of this model really... people signing up people who ultimately would use all the Amway products and tell their friends about it.
Now I have no idea if the above definitions are correct and I'd love comments or suggestions on how to describe it better. Let me know!
technorati tags:direct, sales, network, marketing, multi, level, marketing
