Travel and Cruising

In the world of network marketing there are many different product sectors. One that seems to attract a lot of people is the travel industry. YTB Travel and Cruises may be one of the better known multi-level-marketing (“MLM”) companies in this arena. Even so, is this one of the better opportunities out there, or might this company have problems you may want to avoid.

The Company

This company provides travel services to the public, in general, by way of establishing a network of representatives and travel agents using an MLM model. It was founded by Lloyd Tanner in 2001 but is now a publicly traded company after its merger with Rezconnect. com.

The Products

Travel services are provided by the YTB travel network. So, as you might expect, a customer would purchase their needed flight, cruise, accommodations and ground travel services from a representative or agent of this company. The YTB travel agents and representatives have their own company replicated websites from which to provide these services in competition with portals such as Travelocity, Hotwire, Expedia, Priceline, etc., as well as all of the independent and corporate travel agents. Additionally, the company and the agents, but not the representatives, sell the business opportunity itself.

The Business Model – The Opportunity

The YTB business opportunity affords its representatives and agents commissions on the services they provide to their customers. You can become a representative for free, but it will cost just under $500 to become and agent and receive the tools and other upside benefits for that title. Additionally, the company has recently added a new opportunity, an online e-commerce site called Zamzuu, for its associates. This portal affords the customers rebates generally in the range of 2.5 – 3.0% from major establishments. That’s a bit of a departure from the model, but does offer added income opportunity for the associates. The most lucrative offering, however, seems to be selling the business opportunity itself to others. Public records show that YTB generates almost 75% of its income from the sale of the business opportunity along with training materials and business tools

This latter fact has contributed to some issues that have caused many people to avoid this company. In fact, this company has a history of fighting challenges to its legitimacy as a legal MLM company. Even so, a very reasonable number of its associates compared to other accepted MLM companies do make money. Keep in mind that a very small percentage of any MLM company associates actually make a respectable amount of net profit.

If you are going to succeed with this company, or any network marketing company for that matter, you will need to achieve a very high customer base. In today’s world selling to family and friends is not going to cut it. You really need to learn how to use the most efficient tool available, the internet. Why not do that right away, even before deciding on what product or service you will promote.