Last week I was asked my opinion of a business opportunity of a company I’d never heard of. My simple answer was, “I don’t know anything about them.” I did end up doing some very little digging, which included going to their website and viewing a three-minute recruitment video.
It was a typical video of happy anonymous people talking about freedom. And then there were the testimonials which included some money figures, with significant amounts of debt that some of them had paid off. The implication was that the money they were making from this particular business opportunity is what they were using to pay off those bills.
The truth is that this company offers its distributors a plan to get out of debt. I think it’s great that the company offers a debt-elimination plan. The video though is misleading because the debt was paid off not necessarily because these people were making any money with this particular business.
What I know about debt-reduction programs is they have little or nothing to do with increasing your inflow, and everything to do with decreasing your outflow.
So the hook for this particular business opportunity is that you can become debt-free. It’s a good hook. Debt is a serious problem. People, in general, are lousy money managers. And because the crazy amount of credit that people have had access to the last decade, people drowning in debt has become an epidemic.
Here is the good news: You can get out of debt. And you can start the process today. There are so many resources, and so many free resources to help you. One of them is
Dave Ramsey.
I am late to the party, since I only recently heard of him. But when I mention his name to some folks, they start fawning about how great this guy is. I ended up checking out two of his books, Financial Peace and
The Total Money Makeover, from the library and reading them just to see what all the fuss was about. And I gotta say I like how he thinks, what he says, and his plan for ridding oneself of debt and for building wealth.
My husband and I are debt free. We became debt free before we knew of Dave Ramsey, but using the same principles. And he’ll be the first to say that there is nothing revolutionary in what he says. So what sets him a part from others out there?
First, he’s been there. His story of, in his words, the idiotic choices that he made, and all the feelings of fear and stress he felt, makes him empathic and passionate about helping people.
Second, he doesn't sugar-coat the truth. He tells it like it is, and tells us what we need to hear, such as to "Grow up!"
Third, he challenges people to get angry about their debt. He knows that it is emotion, not logic, which moves people. So while his plan for debt-reduction and wealth building is very methodical and logical, he is good at lighting a fire under people to get them thinking differently, and moving them in the right direction.
Fourth, and maybe the most important, he has created a community (live and virtual) of folks who are in the process of, and who have succeeded at, ridding themselves of debt and changing their thoughts about money. It's a community where people can get encouragement and support, just by the mere fact of knowing that they are not alone.
