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November 17, 2006
DeVos Loss, Amway's Gain
By David Robison in Amway
Interesting headline from a quote by Alticor spokesman, Rob Zeiger, "This has been nothing but a positive for our company."
From the article:The Grand Rapids Press titles it "Election,'nothing but a positive'".
"Alticor Inc. was dragged into the governor's race when Dick DeVos, its former chief executive and son of the founder, threw in his hat for the state's top job.
And for the first time, the company fought back to protect its image and that of its subsidiaries, including Amway, with a series of commercials and blistering rebuttals to Democratic charges it shipped jobs overseas.
The shift was major for the company, which in the past quietly took lumps from critics, preferring to suffer in solitude rather than risk the spotlight.
Just because the general election is over, don't expect Alticor Inc. to crawl back into its shell."
Zeiger goes on to explain, "It reintroduced us to a lot of people. It also showed us how much farther we have to go."
The article says that after the "I Am Amway" ads began to run; Alticor employees asked why the campaign had not ran 20 years ago. As an IBO, I agree. Luckily, Alticor plans to continue running the ads through the end of the year, as well as the new Quixtar ads appearing on TV and magazines.
Further in the article, Zeiger says,
..."We are also taking some of the lessons that we learned, to talk to our colleagues in other parts of the world,"
He said the lack of information that came out of the company before the election wasn't because of "bad intention."
"It was partially because we are a private company, and we were happy to stay out of the limelight," Zeiger said. "Part of it was that product advertising and advertising to attract distributors were not always seen as effective for us. We're rethinking that."
Zeiger said the company didn't realize the importance of getting its message out.
The company also launched a blog to respond to criticism.
It's a real blog, complete with comments and I have to say it's pretty good reading and one of the writers is pretty funny.
The article also quotes Bill McKendry, founder and chief creative officer of Grand Rapids advertising agency, Hanon McKendry.
"Amway has a history of overcoming the odds," he said. "They just need to get out and manage their image and brand more. It's like politics: If you let the other side define who you are, you are not going to get the results you want."
McKendry said Alticor is a great company and a great employer, but questioned the title of its advertising campaign.
Running an "I Am Amway" campaign after abandoning the Amway name in the U.S. in favor of Alticor and Quixtar, "adds to the confusion," he said. "If they say they are not Amway anymore, and then try to build the Quixtar and Alticor brands, why are they coming out with an "I Am Amway" campaign?"
In my opinion, McKendry should already know the answer to this question for two reasons.
First, If you followed the Devos-Granholm race, then you know that DeVos was tagged as "the Amway guy" early in the race; not the Alticor guy or the Quixtar guy.
Second, if you live in a close knit community or small town, then you know that the place that changed its name 15 years ago is still called by its original name by the locals.
Alticor attacked the issue as it was presented to them; as an "Amway" issue. They fought hard to prevent the attacks against DeVos, the Amway guy" from being attacks against "Amway" the company, even if the name had changed.
To me, and my biased IBO view, I'd say that Alticor, Amway, and Quixtar are taking to heart all the comments on blogs like these, and really striving for a change. From their Accreditation Program; to an end to shying away from the Press; it looks like some transparency is starting to breakthrough the opaque-ness, that was Alticor.
Heck, even Kia over at The Real Quixtar Blog is redesigning his blog to add comments, trackbacks, and RSS feeds. And Beth Dornan, (be still, my beating heart) is moving her blog to a dedicated website.
Maybe, just maybe, DeVos' loss will be Quixtar and Amway IBOs' gain, as well.
Comments
Nov, 17, 2006
I knew Amway since 1996 and made got a belief $ 500.00 cheque from Amway Corporation and so other working IBO.
What I learn from this Business is it's a True freedom and the door opens to any one, including the evil mind human being and more likely I feel that God called us to use this business to save the world.
We as IBO need to stand up and fight for Amway Freedom( freed so many diamonds ). It's time to destroy the negative mental society that has been poisened the world for long time. Amway/Quixtar are the business or program that help open the new world of possibilies if we looked at it carefully.
Thanks for having my input,
Boonnhong Korasack
The PR push is continuing. I recently found that Quixtar PR has opened an account on YouTube
Oh, I bet Quixtar recruiting in Michigan jumped with Dick running for Gov....not.
"...I feel that God called us to use this business to save the world...."
Here we go again...
PW
"...I feel that God called us to use this business to save the world...."
Here we go again...
PW
Hi:
I am also a quixtar IBO but I agree with what PW is stating. It's this slimeball AMO attitude -quoted above-that has to go in order for amway/quixtar to start being perceived as a positive business opportunity.
bobt. - not every "amo" has that kind of attitude. But I agree, those that have it need to tone it down, as per the Quixtar accreditation guidelines.
freed so many diamonds
How many?
What is the total number of currently qualified US Diamonds? And any math supporting it? (Net number, 50 new is incomplete without how many didn't qualify)
Bob T.,
"Slimeball"?????? A bit harsh & uncalled for....don't ya think?!?!?
Well anon, I could use other choice words, but this seems to be a respectable website.
wow. 'somebody' had a really bad, PERSONAL experience.....
Bob,
"It's this slimeball AMO attitude"
What would you replace that attitude with to make it a more "positive business opportunity"?
"wow. 'somebody' had a really bad, PERSONAL experience....."
So, if the majority of people who sign up for Quixtar end up quitting because of their bad personal experience, could you say that GENERALLY, people have a BAD personal EXPERIENCE?
:)
No win = more spin. With each and every loss (financial, political, etc) the spin gets more intense. They've been spinning so much they don't even know which end is up anymore. This organization looks lost to me and their followers look like fools.
Kendall,
Not sure of your point....although I AM sure you're trying really hard to be a smart aleck or funny or something...
It didn't work.
Anyway, MY point was that although Bob's experience may have been real & legitimate, it was a PERSONAL experience. Therefore, NOT the experience of the general IBO public. He should not paint a broad negative brush over all of the IBO's (which is what the AMO/QMO's are made up of) just because of his PERSONAL negative experience.
Anon
Alticor can access the most powerful positive campaign it could ever hope for, and the cost is zero!
How?
Simply take the handcuffs off the IBOs and let them start posting web sites WITHOUT the Quixtar Thought Police monitoring them.
The few negative sites out there would be buried in the avalanche because there would be a flood of positive.
The most impact would be that the source of the positive would be from the IBOs in the form of home made sites, not the corporate sponsored ones.
Currently the corporation disallows so much text and independently thinking sites that it's stifling it's own growth, and that of it's IBOs as well.
Quixtar's Rules Dept. srikes down text like 'residual income', 'financial freedom', etc., and not like you would think. I mean you can't even use the words, even to say that's it's possible.
Further, IBO's are not allowed to put up sites that reveal their IBO numbers, yet the Quixtar site can "sponsor" people.
And, IBOs can't market the products themselves either.
Regardless of how Quixtar might package their reply to these issues, their actions are clearly retarding sponsoring and sales. Why would they do this?
To tie the hands of the IBO is total insanity, unless the corportation is protecting someone.
Let's see, who could possibly not want the IBOs to sponsor someone or sell some product through their own site?
Now there's a blog topic I'd like to see discussed here, but I don't think we'll see that anytime soon.
Why? Why are IBOs' not allowed to sponsor directly from their own sites as they see fit?
kurt,
even if there are certain things u can't say on your site, it seems to me that it's still a pretty successful way of helping the business grow.
and it's not the quixtar website that sponsors people, it's the IBO's personally who do that. it just happens to be through quixtar's site.
what's so wrong about that?
One more day is left for the old folk, while don't we feed our mind with any thing that will help us to appreciate for other success citizhad been sacrified them self, so others learn from their mistake.Too bad that some people didn't even relize that so many Americans and Canadians Citizens had paid the price to protect the freedom for us in abroad. We will face big change in 2007, so don't make fun of IBO. Hapy new year love from Bev.
I am glad that AMWAY came back to rescue North american naive citizens. We as IBO are doing Moses job, yes it's tough to make 95% of people understand the concept. We are at the rigth place and the right time no matter what happen to our ecomy, we will survive.
Just hand in there, just like me, because there is no place to go.
Thanks AMWAY Founder!
Love from Bev
I agree, Dave! I read that article, too - and think they have the right idea, albeit 20 years too late.
I also suspect (hope??) that the "I am Amway" campaign is a nose-thumbing at the AMOs who've denied their affiliation with this good company for decades. It's time for the Corp to reclaim their name!!
And yes, those of us who live in the W Michigan area will ALWAYS call the Corp "Amway" ;-)
Deb
Posted by: Deb | November 17, 2006 4:02 PM