In this HempWorx Affiliate Review, we will be discussing the truth about what is called “opportunity” on the HempWorx.com website, and if it was really an affiliate program or just another MLM scheme.
This is so important to understand and it is important to be careful before you join this program because there’s a big difference between affiliate marketing and MLM schemes, and each one needs different effort and brings different results, and MLM schemes are not as lucrative as they might seem and might make you lose lots of money before you make back any of it.
Also, I will lead you in the last section into the right way of doing affiliate marketing by building a real, long-term business that you own instead of relying completely on someone else’s program like it is with HempWorx.
So without further ado, let’s get into the details of this review.
HempWorx Affiliate Review Summary
- Name: HempWorks “Affiliate Program”
- Website: www.hempworx.com/opportunity
- Resources: 60 of 100
- Success Stories – Testimonials: 20 of 100
- Affiliate Program: 30 of 100
- Price: $69/month for the lowest package (+$20 activation fees). And gets expensive quickly for other packages and you have to keep buying yourself so that you keep making commissions on your referrals.
- Legit? Yes.
- Recommended? Not by me.
Overall OnlinePassiveIncomeGuide.com Rating: 37 of 100 (Check my #1 recommendation 97 of 100)
Summary: HempWorx Affiliate Program operates more like an MLM model rather that an affiliate marketing, and even though some people might make money with it, but only less than 3% of its members/affiliates make more than $90/month on average (revenue and not profit). (Evidence from their website below)
What Is HempWorx Affiliate Program (Opportunity)?
First of all, HempWorx.com is a website that sells MyDailyChoice’s CBD oil products online, and it gives its customers the opportunity to make money through promoting the same products they buy to others through their own unique link. (Affiliate link).
And while the model of giving someone (the affiliate) a commission on every sale or referral they bring is a legitimate way that is called affiliate marketing, but often times, it is confused with another model that is called MLM (Multi-Level-Marketing), and the latter is associated with the high risk of wasting lots of money and not making it back.
And while HempWorx’s opportunity to make money is being promoted as an affiliate program, but after taking a good look at the details of this program and its compensation plan, it appears to me that it actually work based on the MLM model.
More details in the next section.
How Does WempWorx Affiliate Program Work?
HempWorx Affiliate Program seems to work more as an MLM program rather than as an affiliate marketing program.
And to know the difference, then in brief, in affiliate marketing, the affiliate can promote some company’s products to others without having to buy the products for himself. While in MLM schemes, the “affiliate” must first buy the company’s products or packages before becoming allowed to promote them and making money his/her referrals.
And this the problem with the HempWorx Affiliate Program, you have to buy products for a minimum cost before starting to promote them to others.
And you might that it’s the company’s right to allow only their existing customers to promote their products, and I agree with you.
But..
Here comes the bad thing; you need to keep buying the products for a minimum amount of money every month in order to remain eligible for making commissions on your referrals’ purchases.
This means that if you refer a new customer/recruit this month, and you make a commission from what they purchase, while the next month you don’t purchase for yourself for the minimum necessary spend, then you don’t get any commissions from what your referrals purchase during the next month!!
Actually, they might close your “affiliate” account!!
So, it now seems that you have to keep buying HempWorx products in order to keep making commissions on what your referrals purchase.
Another downfall is that there are different packages of My Daily Choice products offered on the HempWorx website for different prices, and if you want to make commissions on any referral’s purchase for any specific package, then you need to purchase that package first.
So, if you purchase the $39 package, and your referrals start buying the $599 package, you don’t make commission on those purchases because you didn’t buy the $599 package yourself.
And remember, you have to keep buying that package every month or they might close your account!!!
This is a risky business model, and it is different from affiliate marketing because here (in MLM schemes), the aim of buying products will be in order to be illegible to promote them and not because you really need them, while in affiliate marketing as you can learn it in my top recommended affiliate training program, you don’t need to buy the product you promote in the first place, or at least you can buy it once and keep promoting it without paying for it every month.
HempWorx Compensation Plan
The compensation plan of HempWorx affiliate program is stated on their website, but here’s a brief explanation:
You get ranked based on your purchases for the month, and the amount of purchases translate into what is called Business Value (BV), as follows:
- Unranked: <20BV ($39-$69/month worth of spend)
- Builder: 40BV ($69/month)
- Director: 90BV ($199/month)
- Executive: 200BV ($599/month)
And there are some other higher packages.
And in order to make commissions from your referrals’ purchases, you need to purchase the same packages yourself. Meaning that if you purchase the Builder package and your referral purchases the Director package, you might not get credited for the commission of that purchase.
Therefore, if you want to make commissions on higher packages, you need to keep buying them every single month.
And the commission is different based on what package you and your referrals buy.
However, as an MLM model, and starting from the Director level, you not only get paid for the purchases made by the direct referrals of yours, but also for the purchases of your referrals’ referrals, but a different percentage as in the following table.
But remember that you only get paid for the purchases on the packages you have already purchased yourself.
HempWorx MLM/Affiliate Program Results
And if you think that getting paid for purchases on different levels of your referrals and their referrals, then you better don’t get too excited.
As this kind of business model usually performs under than what is expected and not many people make real money with it. Probably less than 1%.
And the evidence of that is the following table from the income statement on the HempWorx website:
As you can see from the last row in the table, the average Builder member makes $10.22/month, and they represent $57.32% of the total number of members!!!, even the average director makes $90.52/month.
And the Builder, Director and Executive members together make up to 97% of the total members of the HempWorx MLM network, and each one of them makes on average $90/month or less based on their rank!!
This leaves us with less than 3% of the total members that make on average more than $90/month based on their rank!!
And remember that every single member pays on monthly basis.
For example, the Builder member pays every month at least $69, and the average Builder gets in return $10.22/month, which means that they are actually losing around $59 every single month!!
And the Executive needs to pay $599/month in order to keep their ranks, and the average Executive makes back around $90/month, which means that they are losing around $510/month on average!
This is not to mention the expenses they need to pay on the advertising and networking event in order to recruit people to join the system.
This is the true risk of joining MLM schemes where you have to pay for what you promote. And with HempWorx MLM program, you need to keep paying every single month in order to keep your rank and keep getting commissions from your referrals purchases, even if you don’t need the products for your own use.
While in a real affiliate marketing program, you can promote to people without having to spend money on buying what you promote.
What You Get If You Join The HempWorx MLM Program
If you join the HempWox affiliate (or MLM) program in order to recruit people to also purchase the MyDailyChoice products, then you get the following resources in order to help you manage and track your progress in promoting HempWorx products:
- Mobile Business App
- Starter Kit
- Landing Pages
- Tracking Backoffice
The landing pages are designed to help you convert prospects into customers by inviting them to visit these landing pages that are designed to promote the products to people and convince them buy through your links on those pages.
And the Tracking Backoffice is a dashboard that includes the necessary statistics on your promotion efforts.
However, and although I always insist that a successful affiliate marketer must have their own website, but I want to emphasize that the mentioned landing pages here cannot be considered an equivalent to a real website as these are designed to sell only HempWorx products and you can’t reuse to promote other products as an affiliate.
Also, you have no control over these landing pages or the tracking backoffice as they might close it for you if you don’t keep buying their products.
This is completely different from having a real website for your affiliate business that no one can take away from you like it is taught at Wealthy Affiliate, the place that teaches you how to really build a legitimate affiliate marketing business.
The Real Cost Of Joining HempWorx “Opportunity”
As any MLM operated program, the cost of joining HempWorx seems to be low at the beginning, but it increases quickly with the fact that you need to pay for each package in order to get commissions whenever your referrals buy that package.
As I mentioned earlier, the Builder package costs $69/month, the Director package costs $199/month and the executive package costs $599/month.
Not to mention that they will charge you $20 one-time activation fee on any of the packages as an exchange for the “website” they provide you with.
However, that’s not all, as you still need to promote MyDailyChoice products by driving targeted traffic to your landing pages and that means paid ads!
While if you have a real website you can optimize it for search engines and get the free organic traffic into your website where you can promote various products from different affiliate programs.
Check the last section on how to do that!
What I Like about HempWorx MLM Program
1 – CBD Oil Industry Is Booming
The CBD industry is getting more and more attention due to the legalization that happened in some countries and some American states in the past few years, and of course, due to its health benefits.
And there’s a great opportunity to make money in this industry either by selling CBD oil yourself, or by promoting it as an affiliate, but through a real affiliate program where you don’t have to keep paying to it in order to promote it, and not through an MLM program.
More on how to do that in the last section as I promised.
What I Don’t Like about HempWorx MLM Program
1 – MLM & Not Affiliate Marketing
As I explained earlier, there’s a big difference between Multi-Level marketing and Affiliate Marketing, and this difference could make or break your business!
Getting involved in MLM schemes comes with a high level of risk as you have to pay in order to promote such programs, and in HempWorx case, you need to pay and buy the products that you might not need every single month in order to keep your rankings or the might close your account.
As I showed you in the Income Statement in the HempWorx Results section above, less than 3% of HempWorx “affiliates” make more than $90/month in commission (although they pay more than that in order to keep their ranks, lol).
That means that actually the majority of the members of this program are losing money. And this doesn’t depend only on their performance, but mainly on the nature of MLM schemes that are designed to serve only the top 1-3% of their members.
While if you do affiliate marketing the right way, then the return on your investment is depended on your efforts mainly and many people can make a full-time income with it instead of just the top 3%.
2 – High Recurring Cost
As mentioned earlier, the lost rank “Builder” requires you to pay at least $69/month in order to keep it, and you need to pay for higher packages in order to get commissions on your referrals purchases from those as well.
This means that the Executive member needs to pay at least $599/month in order to make back on average $90/month!! What an investment.
And this is not to mention the cost that you need to pay in order to promote HempWorx through the ads and the networking events.
While at a much lower cost than the cost of the Builder package that costs $69/month, you can get the best training on affiliate marketing, premium web hosting for up to 25 websites with SSL certificates and other services, tools and community support and weekly live webinars that allow you to build your affiliate marketing business the right way. (More in the last section of this HempWorx MLM review).
3 – HempWorx Affiliate Program BBB Complaints
There are many negative reviews on Best Business Bureau’s website regarding HempWorx “affiliate program”.
As explained earlier, it seems that many people had their accounts deactivated due to inactivity (not buying for themselves for the minimum necessary amount).
4 – Selling CBD Products Is Not Legal Everywhere
In many countries, and even in some American states, selling CBD products hasn’t been legalized yet. So, if you want to get involved in this field, you better study the legislation in the country where you want to promote these products.
5 – You Don’t Build A Real Business
In MLM, your only purpose is to recruit others to join a certain system or network. And many of these networks get shutdown by the FTC due to following the pyramid scheme model or because they become impossible to maintain after a while due to the nature of the payout structure.
And in such case, you lose all your effort because your whole business is to promote that network or program, and you didn’t acquire the skills you need in order to promote other programs or products as an affiliate marketer.
6 – No Website, No Brand Or Long-Term Return
If you made any money with MLM schemes, then it won’t be for long as you might lose everything overnight if that system has been shutdown or because your membership got deactivated by the program itself.
And with HempWorx, since you don’t own the landing pages they gave you or any website of your own, this means losing everything!
While when you build a real affiliate marketing business the right way through a website that you own, then you are not under the mercy of anyone because no one can take your website away form you, you can promote whatever program or product you want, and even if one program doesn’t accept you, you can promote another program that offers similar products.
Your website is your asset!
Who Is HempWorx for?
Like in my reviews of The Super Affiliate Network and Earn Easy Commissions, I don’t highly recommend joining programs that are based on the fact that you need to pay in order to join them, and then bring more people to do the same.
The result of joining such programs often similar where only the program owners and the top 1-3% make real money, while the rest only lost money.
If you want to join HempWorx affiliate program, then do it at your own risk.
While if you want to do affiliate marketing the right way, then you need to learn it from a comprehensive training program like the one in the last section below.
HempWorx Support
I haven’t joined the HempWorx affiliate program myself as I already know the risks involved, but as mentioned earlier in the complaints point above, there seems to be many complaints about the fact that payments get delayed and that many accounts have been shutdown due to inactivity or other reasons without a prior notice.
Conclusion – Is HempWorx Business Opportunity a Scam or Legit?
I wouldn’t say that HemWorx is a scam as there are products involved in it, there’s an income statement on their website, and there are real products that are being promoted through their program.
However, I would like you to know the risks involved in getting into a program where you need to keep paying in order to promote it, and in building your entire business on someone else’s platform without owning your own website.
As I explained about the income statement of HempWorx, the vast majority of the HempWorx affiliates make less than $90 for the Builder, Director and Executive ranks that cost $69, $199 & $599/month respectively.
Be aware of that before getting in!
- Name: HempWorks “Affiliate Program”
- Website: www.hempworx.com/opportunity
- Price: $39/month for the lowest package (+$20 activation fees). And gets expensive quickly for other packages and you have to keep buying yourself so that you keep making commissions on your referrals.
- Legit? Yes.
- Recommended? Not by me.
Overall OnlinePassiveIncomeGuide.com Rating: 37 of 100 (Check my #1 recommendation to learn affiliate marketing 97 of 100)
Final Thoughts & My Recommended Alternative to HempWorx Affiliate Opportunity That I Personally Make Money with?
As I mentioned earlier, affiliate marketing is a completely legitimate business model when done ethically, and it is my preferred method of making money online, and that’s why I recommend that you do it.
But in order to make money with affiliate marketing, then you need to learn it the right way, and you need to build your own brand through a website that you own.
And don’t worry, you don’t need a previous experience or coding knowledge. Building a WordPress website is so easy today. Your role is rather to research and create useful content that helps people and makes you money through promoting useful products to people who need them, which is the essence of affiliate marketing.
And where can you learn affiliate marketing better than at Wealthy Affiliate, the same place where I learned it?
With what you learn at this alternative to HempWorx affiliate program, you will be able to do affiliate marketing in any niche that you choose and promote different products from different vendors. You are not tied into one program like it is with HempWorx.
For example, if you have a website about home remedies, then you can promote many programs, products or ebooks about curing some illnesses or health problems on your website, and at the same time, you can promote CBD oil on the same website.
That’s how you do affiliate marketing properly.
And the cost of joining this alternative is much lower than the cost of joining the Builder membership at HempWorx that costs $69/month. Even the annual membership at Wealthy Affiliate costs less than the monthly Executive member cost at HempWorx. Lol.
And joining my recommended alternative is better because they teach you how to build a real business and they provide you with the training, tools, web hosting and the premium support, which will allow you to build a real affiliate marketing business where you aren’t reliant on one affiliate program or product like it is with HempWorx.
So, the cost of joining WA is for getting the training and the tools, but you can join as many affiliate programs and promote as many products as you would like to. If you choose to leave wealthy affiliate after you learn affiliate marketing and stop paying to them, then you don’t lose your income or business because you have built your own money making website that you can take with you.
Even better, there’s a free starter membership so that you can try it before you enroll in the premium membership that grants you a more advanced training and better tools.
Following screenshot is from the first level of the training involved in the starter membership, which teaches you how to research the market and find affiliate programs to join and products to promote:
This is the way to learn affiliate marketing and start a long term business in this field.
So, if you are ready and serious about building your own online affiliate marketing business, then..
==>> Click here to learn more about Wealthy Affiliate through my detailed review! (Free membership included!)
And if you have any comment or question about this HempWorx affiliate review, or if you had any experience with HempWorx that you want to share, then leave it in the comments’ section below and I will be answering you back asap 🙂