'Passive Income'- Pyramid Scheme?

[gregdaviesiswonderful]

Wondered if anyone else had come across this?

My friend who has her own consulting business has over the last 6 months become more involved in earning 'passive income'. When she first talked about this, it was from a course she'd been on and seemed straightforward.

However, as the months have gone on, she's posting more and more on social media about this 'fantastic' way to increase your income and specifically about a woman who has influenced her.

This woman seems to run courses about passive income and a lot of my friends posts link to this woman's page or offer discounts to her courses.

It worries me how obsessed she is about it and has many hallmarks of being a scam, especially when I look at this woman's page

-posting income made that month
-posting photos of her holiday home now 'paid off' thanks to passive income
-when I search her name loads of other people are posting very similar content linking to her
-friend offering discounts to this woman's course if you sign up through her link

My friend is usually quite intelligent but I'm quite worried about how much time she's dedicating to this. She says she hasn't spent any money but surely she paid for courses for herself? I'm trying to work out how this might be a pyramid scheme?

I wondered if anyone had any experience of 'passive income' and whether it's a legitimate thing?

I have a friend on FB who has gone down this rabbit hole. All gushy amazing wonderful posts about incredible her life is now she has 'found her purpose.' I've muted her. IRL she's depressed and not the person she portrays.

It'll be a similar pyramid scheme. The only way they make money is by getting others to sign up, or to buy their miracle products (collagen, wonder juice etc etc). Very very few people make any money out of it.

Passive income ought to be extra revenue you can earn on something you've already been paid to do (so the time it took, materials used etc are already covered).

So for example, if I do an illustration for my blog or facebook page (dog training) I might well whack it up on some products on Teemill or Redbubble and let it sit there - everything it earns from there on is passive income, I spend no more time nor money on it.

I could push it more.. it would then be less passive, but I personally don't bother as I did the work for some other purpose so I count that time paid for already.

Sometimes jobs I do, I retain the copyright of the image and can use it (so the other day I did an illustration for someone elses blog/social media stuff), so I stuck that up too.

However... the pyramid MLM hunbots will grab on to any on-trend phrase to try to legitimise what they do and make it seem cool/clever/productive.

So they're probably calling sharing affiliate links 'passive income' but it isn't if you have to share the links and push them pretty aggressively to get people to use them..

I do have an affiliate link on my website - I'd call that passive income (I get 20 quid!).. because beyond sticking it on my website I do nothing (and yes its clear I earn from it).

So.. yes and no.. really. Yes passive income is a thing, no this doesn't sound like it is if she's putting so much effort into sharing links and yes this sounds like an MLM/Pyramid scheme hunbot thing, so yes.. its all lies and fakery.

Passive income itself isn't a phrase which would automatically think pyramid scheme, I try and up my passive income through investing. As PP says it just means you don't need to spend any time/ effort to earn it, it's automatic like a dividend from a share.
That is not to say your friend isn't part of a pyramid scheme though, and the Facebook posts sound really annoying!

I have heard of this.

I make myself a self-appointed expert/guru in money management and invent my own online courses to flog (completely unaccredited, not worth a thing to anyone of note of course).

An onset of predictable complaints about course quality ensues.

I may offer one-to-one coaching slots to an awful lot of people that I end up renaging on as there are not enough hours in the day to give out all the coaching sessions I sold.

The courses themselves are the con.

@WulyJmpr

I have heard of this.

I make myself a self-appointed expert/guru in money management and invent my own online courses to flog (completely unaccredited, not worth a thing to anyone of note of course).

An onset of predictable complaints about course quality ensues.

I may offer one-to-one coaching slots to an awful lot of people that I end up renaging on as there are not enough hours in the day to give out all the coaching sessions I sold.

The courses themselves are the con.

Thanks all.

So it sounds like someone has taken a legitimate idea and it's more the way it's sold and marketed that makes it MLM

Yes @WulyJmpr this sounds exactly like the scenario. My friend is now also an expert in passive income and is selling courses on it and even asking people to link to this other woman and one will be picked at random and win brunch with my friend and an hour of her 'expert' time.

It seems selling courses, linking to this affiliate etc is all she does now and the genuine consultancy business she has isn't getting a look in

It's become quite tedious as every time we meet she tries to get me to come to a taster course of hers (first one free of course as I'm her friend) but I don't have my own business and have no interest.

I'll keep my eye on it but unsure whether to say anything at the moment as she seems in too deep. I've googled the woman and can't find anything but lots of other minion posts from followers about how great she is!

You've suspected correctly.

There's only one reason people need to shout about how great their "career" is on social media and try and "help" others into starting the same "career" is because that's the only chance they have of making money from it.

I know someone who makes money selling payable downloads of ‘insider information’ I can’t be more specific I’m afraid
Once the content is written they just advertise it on social media and wait for people to buy
However it’s not a huge source of income and they don’t shout out about it or force it on others

I think it is linked to forever living. I’ve got a Facebook friend who is simultaneous trying to flog aloe Vera while banging on about passive income and imparting her business knowledge etc. it’s all such a big bloody con.

So as an example there are lots of motivational posts about personal development, wanting to support others to be the best they can be and to get into business.

And then posts like this:

So - question is.... would you like to be earning £8,000-£10,000 in residual income month in month out? And then when you're no longer here, your children pick it up in your will?

This is the power of our aloe. The best business in the world!

I need to stop posting now but it literally dives me insane. I’ve had loads of messages from this person asking me to join their team so I could spend more time with my children while working at home . I just don’t understand how she doesn’t realise it’s a massive con and why her approaching me when I have quite a senior job is just annoying. No I am not going to leave my well paid job to come and work for your Ponzi scheme and no I don’t need motivational business advice from you as quite evidently you’ve failed in business or you wouldn’t be flogging this shite. Gahh.

It's all bollocks.

You can read accounts from those who've managed to escape the cult. The makeup and the aloe vera shit. It's a pyramid scheme and she's basically hoping she will earn lots of commission from the sales her servants make.

My friend does this. She now post exclusively about:

Passive income
Generational wealth
Financial freedom / sovereignty
Building her personal brand
Her “soul tribe” of women that she “works” with
Soul clients
All the other women she “works” with that have enabled themselves to live around the world with their children in free bliss because of building passive income.

She also posts heavily about marketing, why this is not an MLM, how to build her brand and why is no longer a coach, but an enabler of a marketing automation platform that does…something or other to create passive income and generational wealth.

These posts heavily repeat the same terms, and are clearly written by the MLM. She talks a lot about how she was a SAHM who felt resentment her husband earned and she didn’t and whilst she had autonomy, she wasn’t able to solely make financial family decisions. He works in finance and was very against her spending a couple of grand on this thing, and she talks about that a lot as well. She shares information about the payment structure and how she isn’t “there yet but will be earning soon”. She also talks about how she used to have a great career but doesn’t want that anymore.

I can’t help but think it’s obvious she’s been conned. It’s selling the same fake dream as all the others - snake oil sold as reaping all the financial rewards from a highly paid role but not having to actually work or any of the trappings of what you’d have to do to earn a six figure salary eg long days.

Ultimately I think these people are motivated by greed and wanting a free ticket to the rewards of success - wanting a short cut, to circumnavigate the hard work involved. They fall for the lies they’re told about how the rest of us are basically stupid for working for a salary because their way is the secret to financial “freedom”. I kinda feel sorry for my friend but not much - soon enough the scales will fall from her eyes and she’ll realise she’s sunk time and money into utter crap, and could have spent that time and money re-building her career 🤷🏻‍♀️

GorgeousLadyofWrestling exactly this! I hate to think how much they’ve paid to go on the motivational courses. I just don’t know how they can’t see through it- it’s basically a cult.

Surely if she putting work into it and 'building the brand' it's not a passive income

I have a passive income stream that I literally do nothing to, just get paid at the start of each month.

It's all emperors new clothes

Whats MLM?

A relative of mine has a business helping people find the 'magic of passive income'. Always happy to announce how great it is, working and making money for herself (even while she's asleep!)

Which is all fine, except shes on the bones of her arse, and it just looks to me as an outsider, that she and her cronies just sell stuff to each other

I'd rather be a slave to the man and have like, actual money.

I have a friend into this (having pushed and then quietly dropped JuicePlus)

Hers is some kind of Crypto but I'm still unclear how she makes money.

She went to a conference and having read up on MLM, I'm in no doubt she paid to go.

The ‘passive income’ one I have come across is Forex trading and yes, it’s an MLM (pyramid) scheme.

For this one you buy a ‘package’ which is invested for you which makes a guaranteed amount each month - far in excess of interest rates. How does it work? Some of it will be from Forex wins but as we ALL know - that cannot be guaranteed. It is mainly paid from those ‘down’ your line.

So, like any pyramid/Ponzi/MLM scheme, this will eventually collapse, with people having been mislead to de fraud colleagues and friends whilst those at the top run their hands together and bugger off to South America.

I know quite a few people who have joined one. I’ve given them all the info and still they say ‘I’ve done my research, this one is different!’ It’s not and they’re thick. Sadly….

Ah I see, so her increasing income is pretty much from those who she's sold to and their downlines.

@bellac11

Whats MLM?

Multi-level marketing. Basically there's a chain of people - the idea is you make money by selling the company's products and also recruit others to do the same and you get a commission on what they sell as well. You also generally pay to do special training courses etc. As you can imagine the further down the chain you are the less likely you are to make money. I had a cousin & a friend doing different types of MLM - one did physical products & was left with a load of useless stock (and a lot of wasted time & money). Another did forex trading which wasn't so obviously MLM, but she was encouraged to ask friends etc to let her invest their money...(BTW she lost alot money..) and that was all about "passive income" as there was some grand plan behind it all which only required half hour a day to make enough money to enable you to retire early on a great income... It seems really popular in the States and over there they've found that 99% of people who participate in them lose money.