Empower Network Review
Product Name: Empower Network
Product Owner: David Wood & David Sharpe
Advertised Price: $25/month
Upsells: $19.99/month, $100/month, $500, $1,000, $3500
Rating: 0/100
Update 2019: Dave Sharp, one of the founders of Empower Network, is now running a new product called Legendary Marketer. From other reviews, it seems to be a more “legit” venture, with actual training, but the cost is pretty freakin’ sky high, and based on his previous affiliation with this garbage product Empower Network, it’s not something I recommend you invest your money in.
Are You Ready To Work Your Ass Off to Earn Your Lifestyle?
Are you tired of the daily grind? With a laptop and an internet connection I built a small website to generate income, and my life completely changed. Let me show you exactly how I’ve been doing it for more than 13 years.
Oh yeah, remember when Dave charged you ten grand then shut down the company? Yeah. That’s the same guy. Now you want to give him more money because he “went legit”? No way man.
Update 2017: Empower Network has shut down officially, and now the ex owner is asking people to join his new program. It took 4 years to come to fruition, but don’t say I didn’t warn you!
UPDATE 2015: Notice that all “Ex” Top 1% Empower Network have now jumped ship. This is very common in MLMs where people ride the wave of euphoria while everyone signs up, then exits the room before the thing collapses.
What is EN?
Make money by blogging on their network and referring other people to join Empower Network.
Short Review:
Blogging is just a facade for their MLM/network marketing/pyramid scheme, and this program should be avoided at all costs.
Before You Buy:
There is a lot of hype around Empower Network because they give “100% commissions”, and you “make money by blogging”. This is not the whole truth.
The truth is that you make 100% of only some of the commissions, and much of what you earn goes to your upline, ie the people that referred you. After joining, you are then strongly encouraged to ‘go all in’, and ‘upgrade’, which are buzzwords for ‘pay more money’. Remember, in order to make big commissions, you need to actually own the packages.
In typical MLM fashion you pay a minimum fee to enter, and they slowly reveal higher levels of membership that supposedly unlock bigger commissions.
Remember! that to make money with Empower Network, you must refer more people to Empower Network. You are essentially a door to door salesman selling an “amazing” product.
It is an unsustainable business model where eventually, there are more sellers than there are buyers.
Anything Positive?
I’m sure it’s great to be at the top of the pyramid. Too bad there are so many sitting at the bottom.
What You Need To Know:
Not only is MLM one of the worst types of programs to make money with because of the extremely low success rate, they are tarnishing the reputation of real internet marketers like myself. Many of their members spam forums and social media networks trying to refer more members to their downline, so I see this EN crap posted all over the place. EN does not provide sufficient training to actually teach you how to promote your blog, drive organic traffic to it via search engines, or sell real products and services.
The #1 Goal of Empower Network Is To Get More People Into Empower Network
Even though their product is a ‘blogging platform’, this is still a pyramid scheme at heart. Remember, you do not OWN the blog that you write for on Empower Network. EN owns it. They can block your access at any time, and have done it to many people (see video below). There are many free or cheap ways to start out online with a blog that you own 100% of.
The #1 thing you need to be looking for is training. Good training and a quality support community will help you get started online. The next thing you need to look at is sustainability. Will you still be doing this in 1 year? 5 years? 10 years?
One more thing you need to know is that if you do not buy their upgrades for hundreds & thousands of dollars, you will never get those commissions from your downline. If you stay with the $25 monthly fee (plus monthly ewallet fee), you can only make that amount from your referrals.
If someone in your downline pays $500 for the Costa Rica Intensive or $3500 for The Master’s Course, you make $0
Is This Program For You?
I get so many comments from people trying to “correct my mistakes” or “clear up confusion”. Whatever your opinion on MLM or EN is, you need to ask yourself, can I afford this? Remove yourself from all the amazing stories of rags to riches, and pictures of people holding big checks and bigger smiles.
Can you afford to risk $5000 or more on a business opportunity that’s receiving so much criticism from legitimate online business owners? Example 1 | Example 2 | Example 3 These are real people with real businesses, not just guys that blog about how cool EN is.
So, take a long, hard look at your wallet and think – would you take this money to Vegas? Would you give it to a friend to invest for you or would you put all of it down in the stock market today? Can you afford to hand it over to “viral blogging system” even though you are not 100% clear how it works?
Update
Empower is still around, though it’s unclear in what form. They ran a few promos with company names in the sales front but eventually led you to EN in the back end, but I don’t see that so much any more. More recently, they launched their so-called “revolutionary” blogging platform Kalatu, but that hit the ground with a thud (as with their previous attempts outlined in that post).
So some folks are still promoting it, but the hype has clearly died off so I’ve renamed this post “Last Year’s Hottest Scam”. I would just like to indulge a bit and take a moment to say “I told you so” to all the commenters below who spent hours and hours hating my opinion which turned out to be right.
Final Review
It’s become very clear from the comments that this review makes a lot of folks mad. Let’s make a few things clear so I we can avoid some issues down the road.
- I don’t like MLM and you cannot convince me to like it
- I review lots of products, not just EN
- I promote other, legitimate services on this blog
- It is not a secret that Wealthy Affiliate is my #1 rated product
- If you are rude, I will not approve your comments
What is One More Cup of Coffee about? Surprisingly, my goal in life is NOT to talk argue about my Empower Network review! I create websites about various topics like software, homebrewing, health & fitness, and traveling. Then I find companies to partner with, and promote their products on my blog. It’s that simple. There is no secret system.
My online businesses are based on my own personal interests.
I do not have a degree in marketing or computer science. When I started, I couldn’t even build a website. I learned everything I know from an online business training center that specializes in teaching newbies how to start their own online business. I’m still a member today, and continue to generate income from many other websites not related to ‘make money online’, including websites about computer software, health & wellness, and others 🙂
Nathaniell
What's up ladies and dudes! Great to finally meet you, and I hope you enjoyed this post. My name is Nathaniell and I'm the owner of One More Cup of Coffee. I started my first online business in 2010 promoting computer software and now I help newbies start their own businesses. Sign up for my #1 recommended training course and learn how to start your business for FREE!
Can You Really Make Money Posting Ads Online?
CubbyBeatz
I appreciate this post. I’m researching about EN and am getting a well rounded source of information before I make judgement.
Nathaniell
Good luck in your research, and I hope that I’ve presented part of the story that’s not talked about on other blogs.
Stella Wilson
I am also researching the EN. Those promoting the product are pushy. It seemed too good to be true.
Nathaniell
Pushy is what they do best. That’s how they con people out of money.
Jack
Nathaniel,
Congratulations, your blog post did exactly what you intended it to do. Get lot’s of comments which helps your rankings. I personally think it’s of little value. As a matter of fact, I believe it is counter productive. Your opinions are just that, your opinions. Very little substance to validate your claims. Every business has upsells. Why do you think car’s have “options” and “service plans”. To make more money, duh! You are shamelessly promoting your company or “deal” by bashing another. I’m sure plenty of people don’t make money in what ever it is your promoting. You are a capitalist and I applaud that. I do not agree with your methods of this post as much as I do not agree with the hyped up bullshit that EN can promote either. If you’re going to do a “real” review. Dive in, buy all the products, use them all, explain them all, what worked and what didn’t. You’re stating your opinion as fact and that I find wrong. Network Marketing Companies are legitimate business models. There are people a hell of a lot smarter than you when it comes to business law that have come to that conclusion. IN YOUR OPINION they are a scam. I respect that. To STATE all mlm or EN for that matter is a scam, I cannot respect. Get real dude!
Nathaniell
Oh No! You figured out my secret plan! Write an opinion on my own blog, steal traffic from Empower Network, and respond to all the comments from people on my post. Oh, you are so smart! You have exposed my evil ways. Would you like a cookie or is my acknowledgement of your asinine comment enough?
Whatever. Bro.
Joshua Gill
Hey Nathaniell, thanks for responding!
You said this in one of your threads, “Less than 1% of people that join EN WILL make more than 500 dollars. Now THAT’S a fact” (They keyword “will” doesn’t sound like a fact reference from any EN income disclaimer on the site but your opinion). Then later say that your girlfriend works for a company that reports $202 per month income. That’s just from the “active” distributors so where is your weight. You support them because they have a product. Do you not know that you can sell the Costa Rica, 15K, & Masters to a non-affiliate such as a small-business owner and make a commission?
Now in response to my misplaced reply up there (lol sorry about that). You can turn off the EN branding with a click of a button on your blog. So, it’s not impossible :-).
Your argument about them being able to take away your blog at will carries no weight. Here’s why…McDonalds reserves the right to “take back” any one of their stores from a franchisee. Are you using Microsoft or Apple software on your personal computer? It doesn’t matter because both companies have the right to take their software back because when you purchased it, you purchased the right to use and not ownership of the product. Did you know that HostGater (the blog hosting site you recommended in your reply) can “take down” your blog at anytime as well? Nate, in this world licensing, you don’t “own” almost anything with an intent to keep but information.
Your review of EN is uneducated. Now I might agree with you on the pressure selling but man c’mon. Dont you think that’s kind of being soft? Do them calling you a “Wussie” or an adult really upsetting or bad. I think it’s kind of funny.
Nathaniell
Like many other EN promoters, you have a long list of reasons of why I’m wrong, uneducated, and somehow just don’t get it. For any number of reasons I choose to NOT recommend EN, you can come up with two reasons why the argument is invalid. I’m tired of arguing these points because I’ve made my points clear more than once.
I really don’t know whether to laugh or cry at this point. After you go “all in”, please let me know when you have made your money back. Then we’ll see how long it takes you to start generating monthly income. Let’s follow your progress, and see if EN really works. For me, I wouldn’t let Empower anywhere near my wallet.
Mark
Nathaniell,
Are you for real? Are you actually listening to yourself?
You wouldn’t let EN anywhere near your wallet.
You have a blog with an Alexa ranking of 39k USA. What’s that, about 30-40k visitors a month I bet? You must have a decent sized subscriber list too?
If you joined EN and went all in you would be in the top 1% within a few weeks. And you’d probably be making double whatever your making from Wealthy Affiliate if not a lot more.
Nathaniell
Haha. I almost deleted your comment because I’m sick of dealing with EN people, but I guess if you compliment my blog I have to approve it, right? For me, making money is not about how much money I make, but how I make it. EN is a churn and burn MLM company. How many MLMs do you really see stick around that long? It’s always promote like hell, wait til the market’s saturated, then move on to the next big thing. I want to help people build businesses that last, not just turn them into an MLMer.
Plus, then I would have to tell my friends and family that all I do is sell subscriptions. I know that EN people think I make all my money off of One More Cup of Coffee, and that all my traffic is from bashing EN people, but exactly 2/200 posts are about EN on this blog, and less than .01% of my income is from traffic to this post.
My goal is not just to sell WA subscriptions. I do make money from them, but my business is a much broader project than just “promote WA”. I have several other projects that are about online business and have nothing to do with EN or WA at all. Like I said, I teach people to build a business, not promote a company.
Mark
Lol if your sick of dealing with “en people” why don’t you close your comments? Would be the obvious thing to do. You’ve got to expect some back-lash when you go out and publicly slate EN and rank at the top of Google for everyone to see.
I think you have missed the point I was making. I’m not suggesting you go and join EN and start promoting it. You are clearly not going to do that and that’s fine. But the point I’m making is that you come across in the comments as if you yourself would fail if you joined when you know that’s not true.
Plus, don’t group all EN people together. I promote the business just as you promote WA. I also have other projects outside of EN such as consulting and niche websites as I’m sure you do!
Nathaniell
I’m leaving comments open for all types of people, not just EN heads that want to visit my blog to correct my “errors”. And EN people are similar. I have never gone to someone’s blog simply to tell them how wrong they are. I don’t know why you guys seem to think that because I train people how to make niche websites that somehow we are competitors or even in related industries. What I do is significantly different from EN. I do not know what you do outside of promoting MLM, but I do know that you are wasting your time defending the company when it doesn’t have an effect on your ROI. You are just bothered that someone is displaying the facts, not just some hyped up BS about how to become financially free.
Amoy
Hi Nathaniell,
How are you? Hope you’re doing well. It’s very refreshing reading your review/responses of EN, you seem to have done your homework quite well.
Did you get a chance to review [removed] company? If so, what are your thoughts? My finance and I just recently joined (30 days ago), and thus far we have made over $2k.
Thanks,
Amoy
Nathaniell
Hi Amoy,
I see that it is an MLM company. I suspect that I will not be impressed by it, but I’ll add it to my list of reviews. I had to remove the company name from the comment because I do not want this to be an advertising spot for MLM companies.
Amoy
Thanks for your prompt response:-)
Rich
Nathaniell,
I would like to congratulate you on your honest review of Empower. I might even tell my readers about your site.
Well done!
Rich
Nathaniell
Sounds great Rich, I’m glad you liked the review.