It was the end of May, 2011. I got an email notification that one of my YouTube videos had been ‘flagged’ for inappropriate content. “Inappropriate content”? I thought, what the heck could someone object to on my channel?
A Youtube channel that I had been building up since 2006 with videos. A Youtube channel that had hundreds of thousands of views… one video that had 200k views and counting that was getting me major traffic to my ViSalus site.
SOMEONE found my videos to be offensive.
My guess is that they found the competition to be offensive and took a low blow to a woman’s empire – and flagged my vids to effectively not have to deal with my competition on YouTube!
When I clicked to find out what video it was, or how to contest the ‘flag’ , my channel was already gone.
All of the blog posts over the last few years where I had made videos specifically for those posts, now had big blank YouTube screens in them stating that my channel had been shut down due to SPAM content! Imagine that.
So I create videos to help educate YOU, the home based entrepreneur, and you go to click to see my video… and find out that I’m a ‘spam artist’. That’s gotta be good for business, right?
This is all ugly enough to freak out an entrepreneur – but to make matters WORSE, I was running for Ambassador in May, which meant a $25,000 bonus check for my family.
As an internet entrepreneur, one of my main strategies for building my home based business is to run promotions using video to make the call to action. I was at a crucial hour, where I would most certainly get that video promotion out to my list… and my channel was dead.
Think about that – and how YOU might react?
How DO you react in times of adversity?
It took about 7 seconds for me to realize this was a LESSON, a Lesson in Network Marketing Success Principles.
You see, over the last 2 years I have undergone a radical transformation in my understanding of what makes this MLM business model work.
In the past, I worked with sub-par network marketing companies. Of course while I worked with them I thought they were great – but they all had major flaws, and my whole ‘funded proposal/ME FIRST’ marketing funnel was necessary in order to effectively generate leads and massively recruit.
I’ve enrolled more than 600 people – with full product packages – into companies using those methods… and made a six figure income… but I NEVER saw the true leveraged residual income from my MLM business. So I kept this blog up, and kept building my list through selling ‘How To Be Successful at MLM Online’ information, and of course teaching ‘List Building for MLM’.
And you know what, I was successful at building a huge list of home based business buyers and seekers, and I certainly DID enroll many of them into companies… and still do. But I can tell you now, after working with an excellent company for 2 years, that those methods are absolutely NOT necessary to have success with ViSalus, or with any other GREAT company (are there others?).
In fact, I would say that those who know the least about such ‘attraction marketing’ methods will make the MOST here.
Why? Because the ‘old school‘ model works beautifully here, and in this economy everything relies on the speed of trust.
I’d much rather sponsor someone who has no experience in the MLM industry and let them follow the simplest of systems and help them get all the way to Ambassador and beyond, rather than enroll the ‘MLM Junkies‘ who don’t want to share what is NEEDED by their community for fear of what people might think… so they hide behind a computer instead.
So in the hour when my YouTube channel was shut down, did I bug out?
NO, because to hit Ambassador with ViSalus it wasn’t going to be based on how many more sales I could make by blasting out a promotion.
Instead, it would be based on the awesome people on the Dream Team who would meet their goals, by making their list and promoting using the simple system in place to WIN.
I already had the people sponsored in order to get Ambassador done, I just had to dive to them – to give them the encouragement they needed to KNOW they too would one day soon be running for that $25,000 Ambassador bonus.
It wasn’t about how ‘attractive’ I could be… with my ‘attraction marketing model’, it was about helping people follow the simplest of simple systems.
OH MY.
Sounds Familiar, doesnt it?
You’ve heard it before, right?
K.I.S.S.
Keep It Simple Stupid!
Ok, so I’m NOT stupid… just over educated. I’ve been doing this online Network Marketing thing since 2001. I know too much for my own good.
But when my YouTube Channel got shut down, It was abundantly clear that I really had to just K.I.S.S. my strongholds goodbye.
I had to dig down deep into my organization and work to develop leaders… and guess what?
I got to Ambassador in May.
And the next month – I literally traveled from Florida to Michigan to live with Skip and Cindy Taylor for a week – to help them earn THEIR $25,000 Ambassador check.
We didn’t make any fancy videos. We didn’t do webinars, or email broadcasts… we just followed K.I.S.S – and got it DONE.
Melanie Milletics with her $25,000 Ambassador Check and Skip & Cindy Taylor with theirs! Their reaching Ambassador meant I'm a 1 Star Ambassador
My friends and I got to get our great BIG $25,000 checks together, and then travel to Presidential Paradise and get royally spoiled by ViSalus!
This should be encouraging for YOU. If you don’t know how to do all the fancy internet ‘stuff’ I do – consider yourself lucky!
Just TRUST me when I tell you the simple system works – and follow it!
I hope you will also listen to your upline who tells you to follow the system. If you can’t trust them, you may as well QUIT now.
If they are making six figures… listen!
That is… if you are with a GREAT company that doesn’t need any distractions from a funded proposal system. If not, I have something to share with you.
I suppose you can choose what you want in a business.
I chose the leveraged residual millions of MLM over the distraction of affiliate income.
Therefore, I have chosen to K.I.S.S. those many small affiliate checks goodbye as the income from my MLM grows.
I can THANK the jerkface who had my YouTube shut down. It was the final straw that cut me off from my old convoluted ways…
I’ll still make videos and blog, cause I love it -
but if you ask me how to build ViSalus - I’ll tell you to Keep It Simple, Stupid!
Twitter Updates
This makes me furious Melanie! It’s obvious that the only people who will flag MLM content as being spam are just plain jealous and need a serious wake up call to what their spiteful narrow minded stunts are doing to the industry.
How would you destroy the reputation of your own industry on the second biggest search engine on the planet?
The more this gets done, the less network marketers will be allowed to use the channel. So before you flag your competition as inappropriate, think about the bullet you’re about to shoot into your own foot.
Big lesson here, I’m sure the person that flagged your account is still trying to figure out why no one is joining their business.
You’re success remains unstoppable Melanie!
It is obvious that “someone” was jealous of the competition. But it’s also obvious that you are one of the most respected, successful marketers that I know. Proud to be associated with you wonderful lady!
That’s a really good point. One that those with a scarcity mentality would probably have a hard time grasping!
I appreciate this article. It’s people like you who are honest, transparent, genuine and proactive that impact the determination and give impetus to the motivation of others who are following in the footsteps of strong leaders. I am proud of your success and that “none the less” we are able to celebrate it with you, here on line”anyhow”.So may the continuance of God’s grace allow you to “move forward in His Good pleasure for your life and for the sake of all others whose lives you are here to impact.
From the moment we met in cyberspace I knew you were special. I want to thank you for the valuable information and the contribution you make to the everyday lives of normal American’s.This is a wonderful time to celebrate our country and our opportunities and you are a point of light in our national recovery. Looking forward to hearing you on the radio.
Wow Ray! A point of light in our National Recovery? I’ll take that!
I am so sorry your YouTube channel got shut down because of one bad jealous apple. I have watched most of you videos over the last few years Melanie and your content could not be further away from inappropriate.
I love your message in this post. We have gone through a parallel process in the internet marketing industry and the network marketing industry.
I followed you into Visalus based on your experience, integrity and enthusiasm and I have never looked back. We are on an amazing ride. We are experiencing Network Marketing as it is meant to be. We are creating long term residual income and changing the lives of thousands!
You are a wonderful mentor and leader Melanie.
Thank you for writing this post.
Fondly,
Deborah Tutnauer
Deborah,
It is your TRUST that I am grateful for.
All that anyone who is to be successful in Network Marketing needs to do is to find a trustworthy leader, and do as they do!
Having a great company certainly helps
Sorry about the Youtube shut down… I have heard about several internet marketers that I have had their channels shut down in the last six months. I think it has to do with some internal Google/youtube program where they are trying to stop people promoting.
I understood the point of your article that it helped you get back to basic simple sponsoring but are you doing anything to work around this problem that you had with youtube?
Thanks
-Joe
Hi Joe,
I have been submitting every official form they have for trying to get your YouTube channel back, but It would be fabulous if they actually had humans reviewing the individual cases!
Actually, just so you know, its very common at the moment for youtube to close down channels that are advertising to the ‘make money online’ nieche, so if any of your videos had those keywords or were aimed at that, it could just have been youtube ‘cleaning up’ so to speak.
Melanie the bottom line is you cultivate relationships an help people tap into their greatness that lies within themselves. Youtube, or the competition can’t touch the relationships you build with people. Like Dani Johnson teaches, your skills will follow you anywhere you go. Bless you for pushing forward to the top despite a minor setback. The Man Upstairs still blessed you tenfold by always helping people.
Thanks for being a servant leader in the marketplace,
Shaundi Goins
That is such a horrible thing to happen. I wouldn’t have a clue what to do if my youtube channel got shutdown. Did you write to YouTube and complained or did you create a new YouTube channel from scratch?
I did complain, but it appears there are no humans who actually read the complaints at YouTube – so I started again from scratch.
Sorry to hear about that, too bad a lot of this stuff isn’t under human review.
Melanie,
This was an excellent article that was obviously spoken from the heart. You are a great leader, judging by these words. On that note, the most successful people I know in MLM (those making monthly mid-5 figures & 6 figures) don’t use a funded proposal, internet marketing system at all. They do it the old fashioned way, ie. share your company’s plan using the marketing tools they give you, and just let the numbers work themselves out at the end of the day (or month, or year).
Do you still use Ann Sieg’s Renegade program? Curious what you thought about it, or any of the others out there.
Thanks for sharing your wisdom, and yes, you definitely are not “stupid”.
Love the remark about over-educated…I suffer from that too!
Talk soon,
Jim Rodante
Jim,
I no longer use funded proposal systems of any kind. I feel they are simply an added complication to my prospects – who certainly do not need that kind of system to be successful in our company.
Thanks for your kind words, Jim!
Melanie
Interesting…thanks for sharing Melanie. I was tempted many times to join one of those programs (Magnetic Sponsoring, Renegade, MLSP, etc) but never did. It seemed like I’d be getting away from networking and being more of an internet marketer. Not that that is a bad thing. But like you said, was it duplicatible.
I know they all talk about how they sponsored dozens or hundreds of people in a short period of time, and maybe they do, but my gut was telling me keep it simple. And seeing all the top earners I knew who did hardly any internet marketing for the MLM, and them also saying “keep it simple”, it just made sense to do what they did.
Thanks again!
Jim