If you're looking to get involved with a business opportunity then you will most likely come across Liberty League International (LLI). The purpose of this article is to give an un-biased review of LLI from someone who has first hand experience dealing with the top income earners in the company. Then I leave the ball in your court to make up your own mind if LLI is for you.

The Products

LLI offers 3 products in the personal wellness and development arena. The first is a home study self improvement course called Beyond Freedom which retails for $1,495. The course consists of a DVD, 3 Audio CDs, a workbook, a journal, goal cards, post it notes, a pen, and a marker to write on the goal cards. It comes packaged very nicely and looks very professional. For example, the workbook and journal have a nice hard cover with imprinted letters, the packaging itself has nice foam cutouts for each of the materials.

The purpose of Beyond Freedom is to help you realize your full potential by removing self-limiting beliefs. It's entirely geared around having success in all areas of your life and really helps you to look at yourself and identify areas where you might be falling short.

The last two products are conferences. The first, called Liberty Conference, retails for $7,995 and is a 3-day intensive that takes the concepts of Beyond Freedom and presents them to you in more depth.

The second conference, Summit Conference, retails for $12,995 and expands on the Beyond Freedom and Liberty Conference by focusing on the accumulation of personal wealth.

The Opportunity

The get involved with LLI you are only required to purchase a starter kit for $49.95. That classifies you as an associate. Ongoing fees includes $39.95/month for the Back Office and $33/month for the Communications System. The Communication System gives you access to the live training calls which take place throughout the week. Most people also get an 800# for $15/month that is used in offline advertising. With the exception of the 49.95 associate fee all the other fees are optional.

However, the $49 starter kit fee is the bare minimum expense to get started and the compensation plan is setup not to reward the associate who chooses to get involved at that level. In most network marketing companies, especially direct sales, the compensation plan favors the purchase of the product.

The compensation plan works on a system of qualification. Each product is a level and when you qualify you earn profits for the sale of the product and/or conference associated at that level. For example, a Freedom Advisor earns profits from all sales of the Beyond Freedom course. A Liberty Advisor makes money from all Liberty Conference sales, and a Summit Advisor makes money from all Summit Conference sales.

In order to qualify as an advisor at the first level, Beyond Freedom, you need 5 sales of the course to take place after you join. Meaning you need 5 people in your advisors sales register underneath you. Once that happens you break away from your advisor for this level and start building your own register.

If you get involved for just the $49.95 then you have to refer all 5 of those sales to your advisor yourself. However, a product purchase from you counts as your first sale and you only need to refer 2 more sales to your advisor. The other 2 sales can come directly from your advisor as each person they sign up is falling underneath you on their sales register.

This is what is commonly referred to as an Australian 2-up system. If you purchase the product yourself then you need to pass up 2 sales to your advisor. The advisor can and should make the other 2 sales for you.

For the next two levels, Liberty and Summit, you still need 5 people underneath you in your advisors sales register. However, if you purchase the conference then your advisor can fill those 4 spots from their own personal sales and in essence qualify you. There's no 2-up qualification for those higher levels.

The Compensation Plan

When you're qualified as an advisor you earn $1,000 for all Beyond Freedom sales, $5,000 for all Liberty Conference Sales, and $8,000 for all Summit Conference sales. You are paid directly by the person and send the wholesale price of the product/conference to LLI.

The Support System

LLI has an excellent support and training system. There are live overview calls taking place 21 times per week along with training and mentoring calls a few nights per week. If you have a great advisor then you'll also have access to 1 on 1 support which is very helpful.

What is Expected of You

LLI is a direct sales company and not an MLM company so your results are directly related to how many sales you make. You are responsible for your own marketing in order to generate leads. The most popular method is through classified advertising but you can also purchase leads, hand out flyers, market on the internet, use drop cards, etc.

Once you generate leads you put each of them through the "system". The first step is to do some initial screening of the lead to see if they have the desire and are serious to be in business for themselves. Basically, do you feel this person is serious enough to pony up $1500 to get started. If they are serious you place them on one of the live overview calls to get a birds eye view of what LLI is and how it works. Then you follow up with them, answer any questions, and ask for a decision. This third step is usually done through 3-way calling where you dial in your advisor and have them answer the questions for you. But the choice of how you choose to close a sale is yours to make.

Some Considerations

There are a some considerations in this business and with LLI that you will need to be aware of and overcome.

* The business opportunity field in general is a numbers game. You're going to hear a lot of no's before you get to a yes. It's just the nature of the beast. You'll just need to keep putting people through the system and trust that it works because with consistent effort it does. Since LLI is a high ticket item requiring a significant investment you'll have to go through more people as compared to a smaller ticketed item.

This is a business of the phones! An autoresponder or automated system won't sell this business, especially one with this kind of price tag on it. You're going to need to be on the phones putting people through the system.

* There's a lot of bad press about LLI and it's not just a few disgruntled people either. It's a lot of negative comments. They experienced some growing pains when they were first founded and hit some bumps in the road. You can make the case that every major corporation in the world had some trouble in the past but in the business opportunity field trust is a big factor. Any serious prospect is going to do their due diligence on the company they are going to be representing and this bad press can hurt you.

* Some people don't like 2-ups because you're giving away 2 of your sales which equals $2,000. But there's two sides to every coin. When you first get started you rely heavily on your advisor for training and support. It's not uncommon to do prospecting calls together and to even get free leads from your advisor to get you going. Does that mean they deserve all the profits from the sales? Probably not but the alternative isn't much better.

Other companies lure you in by saying you make money on your first sale. While it's great to make money on the first sale you usually are tied to your advisor for life. In those companies the advisor gets paid on all the sales you will ever make. After a while, when you don't need the support of your advisor, it's terrible to have to give away money just because they referred you into the business. Remember, this is a direct sales business and in direct sales you want all the profit.

* Are the products really worth the price they're charging? In the business opportunity field the price is always increased in order for the company and the associate to make money. The question you really have to ask yourself is this:

"Will you buy the product if the opportunity wasn't attached to it?"

If you answered no then you really need to consider if the opportunity is a good fit for you. The bottom line is if you can't stand behind the product then you're going to have a hard time convincing other people it's a wise use of their money to buy it.

* You have to pay $33/month for the company training and business overview calls plus an additional $39.95/month for the back office. Most companies charge a monthly maintenance fee but I don't know of any besides LLI that charge for the business overview calls. A lot of people have a problem with this and it's my biggest gripe with LLI. The $39.95/month fee should cover the associate training and business overview calls. Since it's the overview call that sells the business it's in the best interest of both you AND LLI to make sales.

* Most of the leaders in the company have "team" systems that help automate the business for you by providing you with splash pages, autoresponders, lead managers, and marketing training. These usually cost an additional $30-$50/month.

* There's a significant investment in this business. I have an article on the LLI investment and strategy so be sure to read that for more information on the costs associated with the business. This article is getting long enough and I don't want to take more of your time delving into the strategy of LLI and how the business is really sold.

Conclusion

I hope that this articles gave you an unbiased review of the LLI opportunity. Before getting involved with any business it's important that you feel comfortable with the company, can stand behind the products, and trust that you can earn a substantial amount of money with their system.