More AGLOCO nonsense
March 1st 2007 Posted at Uncategorized
15 Comments 
I noticed that Matt Coddington continues his flogging of the MLM scheme, AGLOCO, in this recent post. Instead of a simple rebuttal I am going to speak very frankly about AGLOCO. It’s not going to be pleasant. I would sit down first
AGLOCO is nothing more than Amway with a toolbar. That’s all it is. The language used to market AGLOGO is the same language that has been used to hype every single MLM scheme in the past decade. The claims are clear – income without effort, passive income etc building wealth just by getting people to sign up. What’s amazing of course is the passion with which people are now defending a company that hasn’t sent them a check or even a single dollar. That is part of the psychology of MLM schemes. In today’s world people need to feel validated, part of a larger tribe. AGLOCO plays on all those feelings. It gives people a tribal identity and valuation. That’s why people are defending this thing with passion. It’s also why this post says it quite a bit about the psychology of AGLOCO, It’s entitled The AGLOCO Community is Dynamic, Vigorous, and Purposeful. That’s a mantra taken from every self help book every written. Most people don’t seem to realize that the thing separating them from the successful entrepreneur isn’t the energy. Most MLM schemes and self-help schemes propagate the idea that if you are just positive enough that you will become wealthy. Hence the popularity of books on positive thinking. That positive thinking and a purpose are enough to become wealthy. Here’s the problem, the other thing separating them is ability. Most entrepreneurs are “purposeful, dynamic, and vigorous. The missing part of that mantra is that more entrepreneurs are far smarter as well. Of course you can’t suddenly become more intelligent so that gets tossed out.
This is a strange idea and it’s one you see all the time. AGLOCO and other MLM schemes play on the idea that you can get something for nothing or next to nothing. This why you see so much AGLOCO marketing for the months before the toolbar even hopes of shipping. They need to rope in every single MLM/real estate course/free money ebook buyer out there.
Let’s take a look at some of the claims that Matt says he is rebutting,
“Argument 1: The Average AGLOCO User Won’t Make Much Money”
Well Matt agrees with this claim. Most people (ie 99.8% of users aren’t going to make anything). He then goes on to make a disenguous comparison to Google Adsense
“Let’s take Adsense for example. Markus Frind of PlentyOfFish.com earns at least $300,000 per month from Adsense alone according to John’s Google Whores post. I don’t know about you guys, but that’s a whole hell of a lot more than what I’m pulling in through Adsense. Does that completely discredit Adsense as a potential source of revenue? No, it doesn’t.”
The key difference here is that Adsense monetizes plentyoffish.com’s business model. Markus went out and built a great service which people found useful. How does AGLOCO monetize a business model? It doesn’t, it replaces it. People are creating sites and blogs in hopes of enticing someone to sign up for the toolbar. Doesn’t sound like much of a service does it? Why would I sign up at your site when I can just got to AGLOCO.com? What’s the service being monetized by AGLOCO? Nothing
That’s a large part of the problem for agloco.com this time around. The network tends to disintermediate knowledge. Your blog hawking AGLOCO isn’t necessary or needed since they can go directly to the site.
I was going to rebut Matt’s article point by point but most of the time he says things that need no rebuttal. Here’s one good point, “(none of us have any real knowledge on AGLOCO at this point)”. If that’s the case Matt, why are you hawking the thing so hard? If you have no real knowledge of the subject why have you bought into this hook, line and sinker?
People are reading AGLOCO’s terms and not actually understanding them, so I will quote them and explain with an eye to modern securities law.
“The Members Own the Company. That’s right – 100% of the company is member-owned. Users make good ideas valuable. Good ideas are great, but without members, they are just that – ideas. Every decision is made by asking what is best for the members over the long-term. It’s a new way of thinking, but it works because we are all in it together. So how do we make money?”
Ok what’s the mechanism for “ownership”? Since they haven’t said and the membership calculator on their homepage would certainly constitute a forward looking statement, where do they plan on listing the company? From their FAQ
What will my shares be worth?
The greater the number of AGLOCO users the more the shares will be worth. We are currently in the process of listing the company on the London Stock Exchange (AIM), and the market will decide what the value will be as is the case with any public company.”
The important part of that is that the market will decide what the value of the shares. So the membership calculator on the “value” of the member is simply made up. Notice that because of the structure of the company they are not listed in the NASDEQ or NYSE. This is because of US securities law. As I said in a previous post, AGLOCO cannot exist as a US company. It looks like they are trying the London Stock Exchange. I would be very surprised if the market was receptive to it.
The Constant Comparisons to YouTube, Facebook, MySpace
MLM schemes don’t provide the same value that organically developed networks do. What’s the value of AGLOCO to it’s users? This is just like your cousin the Amway sales person. You know the guy at family reunions who is constantly badgering you to buy product or join Amway (now renamed Quixtar because the Amway brand was utterly destroyed and completely associated with shoddy goods and sales tactics). All those sites provided some value to their users that had network effects associated with them. AGLOCO doesn’t provide any value.
Furthermore all those companies were traded on US exchanges. I cannot emphasize this enough folks. There’s a reason that the US has the best exchanges in the world and those stocks demand a higher premium.That’s why their site is so demanding that you go sign up your friends and neighbors – they need to create a core user base. As opposed to joining a social network where you can interact and keep track of your friends, the sole purpose of ALGOCO is to make money off them. That doesn’t sound very appealing does it?
The opportunity cost of ALGOCO
Look your time isn’t free. Why would spend so much time and money building up someone else’s business when you should be working on your own? ALGOCO provides no value to the user, what’s the point of signing up?
Matt ends up on the same page that John Chow does with ALGOCO Try it what’s it gonna hurt? Well spending time and energy as a time sink instead building an effective online business for starters. Let’s face it the promise of free/easy wealth is pretty enticing. However like the Philosopher’s Stone before it, just remember TANSTAAFL.
Update
Here’s one stock trader’s view on Agloco.
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Your comment about AdSense is irrelevant to the argument. AdSense was merely used as an illustration – not for how much money one can make, but for whether or not lack of success by the majority is a valid reason for refusing to participate.
The argument – as I understand it – is, the inability of some (even most) people to succeed with an activity is not a valid reason for not participating in the activity, particularly if some do succeed.
In other words, even if I don’t make a lot of money with AdSense, that is not a good reason for removing that income stream from my portfolio.
If anything, the only argument against this is that this is a matter of opinion. (For some, this is a perfectly good reason to quit.)
It’s not that most people don’t succeed – it’s that the Algoco is being promised as an easy way to succeed when it’s not. These promises are often made by the affiliates but they are largely encouraged by Algoco. It has a pretty large opportunity cost and a pretty low pay off. When considering an business, you need to weigh the opportunity cost. That’s the real cost of a MLM like ALGOCO.
Brian, I don’t mind you referencing me for an article but I’d like to ask that you please clearly separate your opinions from my own. Much of this post I feel puts words in my mouth.
1 – Tim hit the nail on the head with my Adsense comparison. I never said the earning models were the same, I was simply illustrating the gap between big earners and small earners. There are thousands of people making a couple pennies a day with Adsense, but that doesn’t discredit the entire system.
2 – I never said AGLOCO was money without effort. That would be a lie. I did say, however, that if AGLOCO doesn’t take off you haven’t really lost anything. If you want to count the little bit of time you spend marketing as operating costs then I can see your point. But I don’t mind spending a bit of time on a product that *could* be the next big thing – that’s how you get in on the ground floor.
3 – You argue that people (which I assumed I’m grouped with given the context of the article) are “defending” AGLOCO. I personally don’t see any of my posts to be “defending” AGLOCO but rather showing flaws in the opposition to it. Comments such as “AGLOCO will fail b/c AA failed” and “Nobody will make money with AGLOCO ever” annoy me because *none of us know yet*. I never said AGLOCO WILL be the next big thing (even though I think it’s going to catch on in a very big way – but that’s my opinion, not fact).
4 – As for your attacks on AGLOCO’s marketing scheme, I would say yes they are taking the route of most MLM and “easy money” companies. Before you crucify them, take a look around you. Everybody who claims to be able to make you money makes it seem easier than it is. It doesn’t just stop online either. That’s business.
5 – “If that’s the case Matt, why are you hawking the thing so hard? If you have no real knowledge of the subject why have you bought into this hook, line and sinker?”
I haven’t bought into it “hook, line and sinker”, but I’m definitely going to give a shot because, as I said, I *don’t* know if it’s going to flop or succeed. After reading over the business model and seeing all of the hype surrounding it (and yes hype does account for a large part of a business’s success, you have to at least admit that they have the hype) I think it will succeed. Hence why I’m getting in early and encouraging others to do so as well.
6 – “People are creating sites and blogs in hopes of enticing someone to sign up for the toolbar. Doesn’t sound like much of a service does it? Why would I sign up at your site when I can just got to AGLOCO.com?”
Do you have any sort of grasp on internet marketing whatsoever? What I’m getting out of this quote is that it’s stupid for third parties to promote a product when you can obtain it directly from the source? Almost every product or service offered online encourages third party promotion. How does that make the service any less relevant?
Anyways I appreciate the mention Brian (although a linkback would have been nice :(). I hope I didn’t rub you the wrong way – I don’t mind a good argument.
“Do you have any sort of grasp on internet marketing whatsoever? What I’m getting out of this quote is that it’s stupid for third parties to promote a product when you can obtain it directly from the source?”
Sure I know more than most people having developed , designed and launched ecommerce sites since 1995. If you read my about, you’ll notice I sold my company in 2000 to a publically traded company.
The internet now specifically hurts these sorts MLM schemes. Look most of time for an affiliate to successful you need to add some sort of value to the product you are selling in order to successful. That’s why so much of the Agloco marketing being done by affiliates is merely attempts to game a search engine and get a high position.
As far as people defending Agloco, it’s not you necessarily, (although I clearly think you are drinking the kool aid), but look at the responses to kumiko’s posts and you see what I mean.
Furthermore you have never once addressed the language being used to market Agloco – perhaps because you don’t realize it’s the same langauge used at every other MLM scheme. The blog post I highlighted is a perfect example.
Okay I think I understand your point a little better now. As for the product promotion, most affiliate marketers I’m familiar with follow the simple product review method where they talk about how great and wonder the product is then cram as many affiliate links in the text as possible. Totally biased and focused entirely on making the sell. I see all of the AGLOCO blogs popping up as doing the same thing.
As far as the language – I think I did address it somewhere… I agree AGLOCO is using some “get rich quick” language – but so does Adsense. Check out the Adsense campaigns (even in their own adwords) and you’ll see ads along thel ines of “Google Adsense – Earn money easily from your blog”. That’s just what these people do.
Actually there is a great deal of difference in the language of Adsense and the language of Agloco. Agloco is specifically using the language of self-help such as Est and other self help schemes. The title of the blog post I referenced is “The AGLOCO Community is Dynamic, Vigorous, and Purposeful”
You will NEVER see that language used at Adsense. That’s a specific sort of language used in a variety of self-help and MLM schemes. Why is it used? Because it works with a certain group of people.
Nice to hear different view about agloco.
This is for Brian , Your family wouldnt happen to be Pipefitters are They? M, P, And C
Yes, those are my brothers. What’s up?
Only time will tell if Agloco will do what they say they’ll do.
jk
http://www.whyagloco.com
Thanks For The Great Information. Good Luck!
Personally, I cannot see what all the hoopla is on either side. I joined Agloco because it is free and it is in prelaunch and it is a start up and because it MIGHT net me some money and because it MIGHT net my network some money. Big deal!
If Agloco works, great.
If it don’t, so what.
It just blows my mind that people have nothing better to discuss than IF Agloco will work or not.
There are very similar concepts that have been operating successfully for many years. SendMoreInfo, Inboxdollars, EmailPaysU, and more! The only real difference is, they don’t have a viewbar and they don’t toot going public.
Any large start up company has enough sense
to NOT reveal all. Agloco may have a few things that none of you know about it yet.
Seriously tho, who really gives a rat? Its free, what people do with their time is their business, and what they want to create sites and blogs about is their business. Just like you find it worth your time and perhaps worth making some money off the backend by posting this article.
How much do you really know about Psychology?
Positive thinking is good and it does help people. Believe it or not, most the gooroos out there are dumb as a rock.
Well Valerie I am not making any money off this article. I am merely pointing out that time spent hawking a business like Agloco is probably better spent developing your own website or forum. There’s nothing wrong with positive thinking, it’s just that Agloco is using that to gather eyeballs and get people thinking they are going to make thousands.
“Agloco may have a few things that none of you know about it yet.”
All of which is designed to make them money, not you.
http://www.tradersnarrative.com/what-everyone-ought-to-know-about-agloco-744.html
“I am merely pointing out that time spent hawking a business like Agloco is probably better spent developing your own website or forum.”
Do you really think we are going to work all day 8 hours on just promoting Agloco.
How do you even know if Agloco members aren’t working on other things. Do some research Buddy.
I have 3 websites. I make couple hundred a day of Adsense Alone. You can’t justify people aren’t doing other things besides Agloco.
I put maybe at the most an hour or two a day on it and the rest of my time goes to other websites that i develop.
and the fact that your not making anything for this blog post. What A waste of time. Why don’t you put your efforts into a “Website” “Forum” then spending time worrying about if Agloco Succeeds or not.
About MLM’s or Pyramid. Why don’t you look at the back of the dollar bill. The US is constructed on structure. Why don’t you look at where you work? Structure.
John – I think a whole bunch of people are going to spend way too much time on it. Agloco is taking advantage of the fact that many people misunderstand the Agloco business model. People have a finite amount of time and resources. A couple of hours a day hawking Agloco is a waste. Any organization only has a finite amount of resources.
“About MLM’s or Pyramid. Why don’t you look at the back of the dollar bill. The US is constructed on structure. Why don’t you look at where you work? Structure.”
What? What does the pyramid on the back of a dollar have to do with anything?