A profit sharing program is a risk/cost free marketing tool.
In short, a profit sharing program (PSP) is a multi-level affiliate program in which an affiliate receives % from sales during the business life of the business (PSP organizer).
In the traditional marketing businesses should pay in advance, for example advertisement's costs. If the advertisement will not generate additional sales, big enough to cover the expenses and to give the business additional profit, the business will lose all or part of the spent money. This is a risk incurred by the business.
In some non-traditional marketing, for example network marketing the risks and costs are incurred by networking marketers. In this case the new networking marketer must pay to an old networking marketer (sponsor) for training or acceptance to the business This is the money he/she may loose.
A profit sharing program (PSP) is risk/cost free as for a business as for a participant of the program. Instead of costs the price for the business (PSP organizer) consists from sharing with a participant future profit from all sales in his sub-net of the participants. This is like a share in the business. So a PSP organizer's proposition is:he/she gives to the participants an opportunity to receive income from the business (share in the future profit) and in return he/she asks for references on new customers. There are no risks/costs as for the business as for the participants in this venture.
In some way a PSP is similar to affiliate/associate marketing where affiliates/associates receive commissions from sales generated by customers they directly referred to the business (they named as sub-affiliates or 1st level sub-affiliates). But the affiliates/associates do not receive income from customers referred by their sub-affiliates. (There are some programs, so called 2-tiers programs were affiliates receive income from customers referred by them and their sub-affiliates, but do not receive income from customers on 3rd, 4th, and higher levels.)
For this reason real money in affiliate/associate marketing can earn only affiliates which can recruit many sub-affiliates. For example, if an affiliate has a web site with a high traffic, then this affiliate probably will benefit from participation in the affiliate program. But if an affiliate has no a such site (as many people do not have) he/she will earn almost nothing. For this reason majority of customers will not be interesting in an affiliate program.
To stimulate interest of customers for references the PSP organizer should give them an opportunity to earn more money. That is why PSP always multi-levels programs. This gives the participants an opportunity to earn more income and gives them feeling of a fair treatment by the business. Suppose a customer John referred a new customer Bill, Bill referred a new customer Tom, and Tom referred a new customer Ellen. Now Ellen buy something. In majority of affiliate programs only Tom will be rewarded from this sale. In 2-tier programs Tom and Bill will be rewarded. The argument is: if Bill did not refer Tom, Tom did not refer Ellen, and there would not be the sale. But the same argument may be applied to John. That is why a PSP will pay to John, Bill,and Tom.
Opinion Reserch Corporation International (ORCI) found that users told an average of 12 other people about an online shopping experience, 8.6 additional people about favorite film, and another 6.1 people about a favorite restaurant. This is the dynamic that powers viral marketing.
It is similar to "nuclear chain reaction". Suppose you have 20 customers and each of your customers may refer five new customers so you potentially have 20*5=100 new customers (1st level sub-affiliates). Each of the 1st level sub-affiliates may refer also 5 new customers, so you potentially in addition have 100*5=500 new customers(2nd level affiliates), and so on. See table below.
Table1. Dynamic of the growth.
Level |
Number of sub-affiliates |
0 |
20 (current customers) |
1 |
100 |
2 |
500 |
3 |
2500 |
4 |
7500 |
If you will give enough stimulus to your customers you may convert all these potential clients into real ones. The share in the future profit may be this stimulus!
An participant in an PSP receives income from sales of sub-affiliates up to a fixed preselected level (usually from 5 to 10). How big may be income of a PSP's participant?
Suppose the PSP rewarding scheme is: 5% on the 1st level, 3% on the second level, 1% on the third and forth levels. So the PSP organizer pays 10% from sales to PSP participants. Let us average sales (ASales) per customer is 100$ per month, and average references rate (ARef) is 5 per client. Under these assumptions a participant has 5 1st level affiliates, 25-2nd level, 125-3rd level, 625- 4th level affiliates. The first level affiliates generate $500 sales, and $25 (5% from $500) comes to the participant. The second level affiliates generate $2,500, and $50 (2% from $2,500) comes to the participant. The third level affiliates generate $12,500 and $125 (1% from $12,500) comes to the participant. The forth level affiliates generate $62,500, and $625 (1% from $62,500) comes to the participant. In total the participant will receive $850 per month.
In the table below are calculations of income for different parameters.
Table2. Income of a PSP's participant in dollars.
ARef \ ASales $ per month |
50 |
100 |
500 |
5 |
425 |
850 |
4,250 |
6 |
825 |
1,650 |
8,250 |
7 |
1,463 |
2,926 |
14,630 |
8 |
2,420 |
4,840 |
24,200 |
9 |
3,789 |
7,578 |
37,890 |
10 |
5,675 |
11,350 |
56,750 |
As we can see from these data for a small fraction of profit (less than 10%) the PSP organizer may increase profit in many times without any risks and costs.
You can estimate an income from participating in a PSP/AP/MLM using our calculator.
In addition to financial rewards each PSP organizer makes own contribution to creation of the "economy of almost equal opportunities" where each person can participate in the profit of any PSP organizer without any risks/costs. Does not matter how rich or educated is a participant, where he/she lives, what he/she is doing. Everybody have relationships, therefore everybody can earn stable income from participation in the PSP.
It is true that an average person will have not more than $100/month from a participation in a one program. But in the "economy of almost equal opportunities" he/she may participate in many PSP programs as from businesses in the local community as far as from businesses in the Cyberspace/Internet. So, if a person will participate in 100 different program with $100/month from each one, the total monthly income may reach $10,000.