Industry Profile
IM mastery academy is a private company founded in 2013 by Christopher Terry and has its headquarters in New York, United States. The company belongs to the direct selling industry using the network marketing model. The company deals with the development of an educational trading platform that provides an opportunity to enter the trading industry and build a network (IM Mastery Academy, 2021). Moreover, it provides a wide range of products that enable users to access market analysis and digital currency trade ideas and identify potential reversals in the forex market.
The main competitors of IM Mastery Academy in the market include ForexCT, Taurus Group, Currencies Direct, and BookMyForex.com. Generally, the company undertakes projects to equip its users with mastery over the market through its products and services, accelerate their growth through live mentorship, and expand their mentorship and learning with unique strategies. Besides, the company has combined its financial literacy products and services with a network marketing compensation plan to increase its users. Since its rebranding from IMarketslive, the company has grown despite the question of its legitimacy by some of the users. The fusion between network marketing and financial literacy services led to an increase of active users to more than 300,000 in 2020 (Yahoo Finance, 2020). IM mastery academy is based on the technology where online platforms are used for financial literacy and network marketing projects. The internet connection is a significant requirement for its users to access their services and products. Thus, with the development of technology, the company can be assumed to progress with it since technology is the foundation of the company.
Industry Trends
According to the World Federation of Direct Selling Associations data, the direct selling industry has a global revenue of $180 billion led by the united states market with $35.4 billion in 2019 (P, 2021). The financial services sector of the direct sales industry accounts for 3.9% of the total sales contribution in 2019. Although the sales of the direct sales industry have been growing in recent years, there was a decline of 6.5% in revenue growth in 2019 compared to 2018 (P, 2021). The trends in shopping habits, workforce, and communication significantly impact the direct sales industry since it involves selling by members of the society to the population using communication channels. Thus changes in any of these factors can significantly affect the company’s revenue growth.
The direct sales industry usually uses either single-level marketing or multi-level strategies based on whether the users earn a commission or not. Whereas a multi-level strategy involves a direct seller earning through direct sales and commission by introducing new clients, single-level marketing involves a seller earning income by buying organization products or services. The major trend in the management of the direct sales industry is mobile team management due to the global pandemic and the need for increased productivity.
Size and Growth Patterns
The company uses a combination of the $5.3 trillion financial market and network to help people earn money using their free time. Besides giving its subscribers products and services to earn money from forex and cryptocurrency trading, IM mastery academy gives its users the ability to earn income through recruiting members by affiliate link and building a team. Due to the limited information on the company operations, the growth and size of the company can be determined using the data on the use of their websites and the growth in the number of their employees.
The company has seen a 156.684% growth in its revenue to $480 million from $2 million in 2015 (Businessforhome, 2021). Moreover, the company has seen growth in YouTube with 1,555,126 views and 58,100 subscribers (Businessforhome, 2021). On the other hand, the number of followers on the company’s Twitter has grown to 18,221. In terms of the employee metric, the company has a total of 2,600 employees with a 1.5% 6-month growth, 18.3% 1-year growth, and 60.5% growth in 2 years (Apollo.io, 2021). The website, however, has a 19.88% decline with monthly web traffic of 930,686 visitors. Out of these web visitors, direct links account for 473,687, 151,157 from organic search, and 191,507 are referrals (Ie.globaldatabase.com, 2021). Also, the company has the only location for its office, which is the headquarters in New York.
Direction and Planning
The company values of IM mastery academy include education, empowerment, and enrichment of the lives of their users and subscribers. They aim to provide users with access to the right information through education, discover the power to control their lives through empowerment, and experience a higher quality of life through enrichment. The company currently focuses on the active recruitment of subscribers through the affiliate program to increase subscribers to their products and services. Moreover, the company aims to use its financial literacy and network marketing program to connect and enable people to reduce economic vulnerability both at the national and international levels. However, the company faces the issue of its operation’s legitimacy, where some of its previous and potential subscribers view the company’s products and services as a scam or Ponzi scheme.
Products or Services
The company’s products primarily focus on forex and cryptocurrency trading and ways to make money in the market. The company sells products such as Delorean, vibrata, goldcup, steady, levels, etc., to help its clients analyze the market and choose the trade they want to enter. Each tool has a specific function depending on the aim of the subscriber, such as long-term or swing, profitability, and trade entry and exit. Also, IM mastery academy offers retail options for its clients only. Each retail plan has distinct tools and features, with the number of training on forex and cryptocurrency and tools increasing with the increase in the cost of the plan. Finally, the company has replicated affiliate websites as a marketing tool and material that can be used to sign up affiliate members and customers by its clients. The company uses a comprehensive compensation plan to promote the network marketing program.
Culture and Reputation
The company tries to help the average person make money online using only a mobile phone and internet connection. One of its main strengths is the provision of its over 100 education programs in 13 languages (IM Mastery Academy, 2021). The founder, Christopher Terry, is viewed as a man with a humble beginning with the vision of serving the world using his platform. However, due to its association with network marketing, the company has been viewed as a pyramid scheme or scam by many people and has numerous negative reviews on the internet.
Company History
The founding of the company can be traced to the change in the career of the founder, Christopher Terry, from the construction business to forex trader. Christopher Terry founded IM mastery in 2013. Terry has been identified to be the construction business before moving to make more money from home in 2001. When he in the construction industry, Terry got into forex trading as a means of making more money from home. After three years as a forex trader and doing well in forex trading, Terry quit the construction business and became a full-time forex trader. In 2013, Christopher Terry founded iMarketsLive, an MLM company that dealt with offering forex and cryptocurrency trading training and signals.
However, iMarketsLive was faced with legal issues with the government due to the trading bot forcing Terry to rebrand it. IM mastery Academy was born as a result of this rebranding where Christopher Terry got rid of the trading bot besides changing the company’s name from iMarketsLive to IM Mastery Academy (Yahoo Finance, 2020). The change of name and getting rid of the bot were the only option Terry had to continue doing business. The association with the previous company, iMarketsLive, has significantly influenced its growth and success. The iMarketsLive company did not have the BBB accreditation, had a D rating, did not abide by the rules and regulations, and flawed business model. Hence, many people do not see the company as anything other scam or pyramid scheme even after rebranding.
Company Financials
The company’s financial status is not available; hence there is no to determine the company sales, earnings, and assets data. However, its website use indicates a decline, while other data on revenue growth on unofficial websites indicate otherwise. However, the company provides an income disclosure statement on their website regarding income generated from their compensation plan by their customers. The report indicates that the company has paid more than $20,920, $2,670, $225 to their top 1%, 10%, and 50% independent business owners between January and December 2020 (IM Mastery Academy, 2021).
References
Apollo.io. (2021). IM Mastery Academy – Overview, Competitors, and Employees. Apollo.io. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://www.apollo.io/companies/IM-Mastery-Academy/5f8f6f0c430b89013a22150f?chart=count.
Ie.globaldatabase.com. (2021). IM Mastery Academy Overview | Company information – IE.GlobalDatabase.com. Ie.globaldatabase.com. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://ie.globaldatabase.com/company/im-mastery-academy.
P, G. (2021). 100+ MLM Statistics You Need for 2021!. Epixel MLM Software. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://www.epixelmlmsoftware.com/blog/100-mlm-statistics-2019.
IM Mastery Academy. (2021). IM Mastery Academy. IM Academy. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://im.academy/.
Businessforhome. (2021). IM Mastery Academy – Overview. businessforhome. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://www.businessforhome.org/companies/imarketslive-review/.
Yahoo Finance. (2020). Yahoo is now a part of Verizon Media. Ca.finance.yahoo.com. Retrieved 20 April 2021, from https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/digital-platform-helping-over-300-130000032.html.
