The problems with Beachbody affiliate program

I believe that Beachbody is an amazing community when used as an accountability group. But it may not be a viable option when it comes to making money online as a side hustle or to replace a full income.

Today I am going to talk about my experience of joining Beachbody as a coach and affiliate. Including how my wife and I spent over $2000 in this affiliate business.

The problem with Beachbody is that they lack to provide any sort of training or education to their affiliates/coaches (e.g: digital marketing, leadership, content creation, compliance, etc.). In my time with Beachbody, I don’t remember attending any online training whatsoever. Most of the calls were about the weather, pep talks, bragging about “results” and talking about how great the company and products are.

Beachbody doesn’t put their coaches through any sort of review process before they let them set off into the world of affiliate marketing. Yet, they do make it sound so easy to make a living promoting their products and services. A lot of people sign up as a coach thinking it’s going to be a convenient way to generate income. As long they know how to write a blog post, install a few plugins in WordPress, and get their affiliate links added. They couldn’t be further from reality. They may be able to convert a few friends, their mom, but I doubt they will succeed as a Beachbody affiliate.

So if you end up clicking on an affiliate link from a coach who does nothing for creating value for his members, off the start, you are disadvantaged. This is a recurring problem in any community based on referrals. Even more when that community has no bar for its members nor education.

What is Beachbody?

Beachbody is a community of people who evolves around health and fitness. Beachbody (“BB”) provides an on-demand video platform to its members (Beachbody On Demand). You can buy Beachbody branded video workouts individually from Beachbody, Amazon or other retails websites.

How to join Beachbody affiliate program?

Beachbody doesn’t have a typical affiliate program like Amazon.com does for instance (see my other article about affiliate marketing).

Beachbody has an affiliate program behind its coaches. Team Beachbody Coaches are eligible to promote Beachbody and earn commissions per sale. However, if you stop your membership with Beachbody, you cannot earn money as a Beachbody affiliate anymore.

There are 2 steps to join Beachbody’s affiliate program:

• Join Beachbody as a coach, go to this official coach/affiliate signup page from Team Beachbody.
• Pay their one-time “Business Starter Kit” $39.95 (USD).

That’s it. In theory, you can then get your links up and start earning commissions. Read below.

How do people make money out of Beachbody?

Beachbody is considered multi-level marketing (MLM) in the sense that you get commissions when your members make sales. Which looks like a form of pyramid scheme for some. However, in favor of Beachbody, you do not have to spend thousands of dollars to join their affiliate program. And, they don’t promise you the world.

As a Beachbody member, you are strongly encouraged to drink Shakeology. That is a plant-based protein shake. And guess what? Once you have your monthly Shakeology subscription setup, you are eligible to become an affiliate for Shakeology too! Not before that. While I can’t believe we spend that much money on shakes. I must say, I fell in love with the Strawberry Vegan.

To see how much we made and how much we spent, keep reading.

How we got into Beachbody

It all started with my wife purchasing “21-Day Fix” in March 2016 through a Beachbody affiliate’s website, “Ali”. Ali had been blogging about health, fitness, family, etc. She was promoting how she was working from home thanks to Beachbody. How Beachbody changed her life in many ways.

Ali became Erwan’s fitness accountability coach (or sponsoring coach). I do believe that Ali was genuinely caring for her members as you will read below.

Ali: […] Thank you and how wonderful! So excited for you and would love to learn more about your goals moving forward. I actually host private, online accountability groups for this program in particular and wanted to see if you were interested in doing my next one with me, which starts on March 14th (and it’s totally free with your 21 DF purchase). What do you think?[…]

Erwan: […] I’m very well, so happy to have taken the plunge! And I want to thank you for sharing your story on your blog and giving all of this information. It gave me the courage and the desire to overcome all of my current difficulties and move on toward a happier life. The first step for that is certainly feeling comfortable in my body to be able to start over. […]

Ali: […] I love that you love to cook! Oh my gosh, this program is amazing for people who are passionate about food! I think that is my favorite thing about the program… it is not about what you can’t eat, it’s about figuring out the right PROPORTIONS for your body and caloric needs. We will work together to figure that all out for you and you will quickly be on your way! […]

Ali: The challenge group that is starting up is perfect for that too. We all have each other’s backs, sharing recipes and tips and honestly just the ups and downs. We truly become cheerleaders for one another too, it is such an uplifting place to be. The way it works is I actually will be putting you into the group THIS MONDAY!!! I think this could be great timing for you! We do a “Prep Week”, where we get ourselves ready to take on the food part of the program… cleaning out the pantry, figuring out what to purchase, working on grocery lists. Then the following Monday, March 14th, we start “pushing play” together! Of course, you can start earlier than that, but we keep that cadence generally speaking.

Ali: As far as starting ahead, you should have gotten the 30 days free trial of Beachbody on Demand, which gives you access to the workouts on your computer free for 30 days. A great way to get started before your kit arrives!

Erwan had a group call with Ali and another upline. There were several members on the call. They had to introduce themselves. This was an opportunity for her to work on her public speaking skills. And to work on her English at the same time. It was one of the reasons she joined Beachbody.

Beachbody Sales funnel

Beachbody is a well thought selling funnel that starts with a free program or membership and makes you purchase new products as you progress. It’s a well designed money-making machine, disguised behind health and fitness. I don’t blame them for that though. Money is the byproduct of what you bring to society. Beachbody provides value to people. It helps folks out there who seek accountability to make a change in their life.

I discovered Beachbody after having tried many diets and was desperate to find an efficient way to eat and push me to workout. And so did I. I started with 21-day fix, it helped me eat healthily and get more energy. Then, I started 22MHC to have even more fitness challenges. Now, I want to continue on this path to get even healthier.

Ali: I know that as you begin this journey, you will have many questions. First and foremost, don’t try to “sell”… I really mean that. Make recommendations, connect and help one person at a time, even if your advice has nothing to do with recommending a Beachbody product. We’re about helping people. That approach is more rewarding and will get you MUCH further and get people coming back to you because you’ve developed trust and credibility. If you want people to get interested in you and what you’re doing, be interested in THEM and THEIR lives first!

How we became a coach (and affiliates)

At the time, we just had moved to New-York. Erwan was working different jobs. We didn’t have kids. So she figured Beachbody could be a legit way of making money online, working from home and getting fit. What’s not to like?

2 months after joining Beachbody, in April 2016, Erwan joined the affiliate program by becoming a “Beachbody Coach”. They’d refer to themselves as “Independent Team Beachbody Coach”. Ali became her “Sponsoring Coach”. The price for the “Business Starter Kit” was a one-time $39.95 (USD).

Ali: My job as your sponsoring coach is to mentor you and give you the tools to be successful. Know that ANYTHING is possible and anyone can be a successful coach. While I cannot make you successful, I can provide you with the systems that will pave the way for your success. Your responsibility is to take these and make them unique to your style while continuing to help others to lead healthy fulfilling lives. I hope to prevent you from reinventing the wheel by sharing what has worked for me in building my diamond business.

Ali: I am your mentor, coach and friend through it all BUT I’m not your boss. This is YOUR business and we want to remove the training wheels so that you can continue to grow with confidence.

Here are the first new coach goals we will be working on over the next 4 weeks:
1. Getting Your Product Paid For
2. Earning Success Starters
3. Achieving Emerald Rank
4. Gaining Confidence

The Emerald Rank is an easily reachable milestone and recognition with Beachbody. The main benefit of reaching Emeral is that it makes a coach eligible to receive customers/leads from Beachbody. Those customers come from Beachbody’s websites and paid advertising campaigns not linked to any coach in particular. Beachbody relies on a Customer Lifetime Value (see my post that explains what Customer Lifetime Value means) to get their investment back. Fantastic you may think? My wife was Emerald for 3-4 months she didn’t receive a single lead from Beachbody. I have no idea how Beachbody’s algorithm works to distribute the leads they get from their websites and paid ads, maybe it was just bad luck.

To reach the Emerald rank as a coach:

• You need to have referred 1 active member.
• You need to have invested a certain amount in Beachbody products. Of course! This is what they refer to as Personal Volume or PV. At that time, you needed to have a personal order of at least 90 PV. For example, Shakeology on Home Direct (i.e. shipped automatically to your home each month) enabled you to reach that volume.

Guess what? Most new coaches get to Emerald by referring someone close to them (spouse, friends & family). May 2016, Erwan got me to join Beachbody too. It’s a smart business model from Beachbody as it drastically decreases their cost per sale. I had no interest in the fitness programs, accountability groups, or the community itself. I joined Beachbody as a favor, at first. Then she got me excited with the idea of earning commissions by promoting someone else’s products. My mistake, as a beginner affiliate marketer, was to choose to promote a product or service (Beachbody) I had no interest in. I learned a lot since then, see how you can set up an affiliate business in 9 steps.

Hi Andrew,
Welcome to Team Beachbody®! You now have access to your Team Beachbody Account and Free Personal Coach.
Your coach info: Erwan

To keep your active status as a Beachbody coach, you need to spend a monthly value on Beachbody products (that PV thing). So I also had to subscribe to Shakeology.

Your Coach started as a Team Beachbody customer just like you. Erwan pushed through the day-to-day challenges to achieve results and wants to help you do the same. Using past experience, your Coach can help you:

• Get started with your program
• Connect with a Challenge Group to stay accountable
• Find ongoing motivation to get your best results

Once you sign in, you’ll also have 24/7 access to the TeamBeachbody.com community and expert nutrition and fitness advice and be able to schedule workouts and track your progress.

Remember, you can still get a FREE 30-Day Trial Membership* to the Team Beachbody Club, which includes streaming access to more than $3,000 in proven Beachbody® workouts with Beachbody On Demand. Upgrade today and you’ll get 10% off all future Team Beachbody purchases, access to customized meal plans, and exclusive brand-new trainer workouts.
As a Premium Club member, you’ll have unlimited access to Beachbody® On Demand for the next 30 days—absolutely FREE! After 30 days, you’ll automatically continue to receive all the benefits of your membership for only $2.99 a week, billed $38.87 quarterly in advance to the credit card you provide today.

I didn’t like the idea to harass friends and family. And I didn’t see myself blogging about health and fitness because I didn’t care. So how did I attempt to promote Beachbody’s products?

My first attempt was to hire people on Fiverr.com to rewrite other’s people content. I resurrected this article about 21-Day Fix for the sake of example. It wasn’t sustainable as it had a cost. And to be frank, I had ethical issues with this.

My second attempt was to create a platform for affiliates of Beachbody. In May 2016, I created fit-reviews.com (don’t bother visiting, I killed the platform when I left Beachbody). I was targeting new Beachbody coaches or existing coaches looking to attract new customers. Authors on fit-reviews.com were “rewarded” by having their affiliate links (Coach ID, Shakeology site) broadcasted across the website randomly. 1 post published = 1 “chance” in the lottery. The more people, the more content. The more content, the more visitors. Resulting in more leads and customers!

I had solved my problem of not believing in the products I was promoting. But, it didn’t work out. I reached out to dozens of coaches. Not a single one showed interest in my platform.

3 months after I joined Beachbody, I cancelled my membership with Beachbody as well as my Home Direct (Shakeology) enrollment (in July 2016). Due to a “technical difficulty”, I kept paying for a little longer and my cancellation became effective in August 2016!

Erwan left Beachbody on August 9th, 6 months after she joined.

Figures

How much money did we spend on Beachbody products

Total spent: $1862.67 (USD)

I went through my bank statements from 2016 to understand how much we spent on Beachbody-related products.

Beachbody Products, one-time purchases, $644.92.

• 02/29/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-470-7870 CA, 154.61, BB Challenge 21 Day Fix Shakeology Triple Combo Pk
• 03/18/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-207-0423 CA, 43.50
• 05/13/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-207-0423 CA, 198.16, BB Challenge Pk CIZE 3DayRefresh Shakeology TR Bag
• 06/06/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-470-7870 CA, 143.14
• 06/10/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-470-7870 CA, 72.92
• 04/05/16, PPL*22 MIN HARD CORPS 800-207-0424 CA, 32.59

Team Beachbody Club Member, $84.64.

You are an active Team Beachbody Club Member and will be billed $38.87 + tax (if applicable) for the Membership every quarter.

• 03/31/16, PPL*BEACHBODY CLUB 800-207-0423 CA, 42.32
• 06/30/16, PPL*BEACHBODY CLUB 800-207-0423 CA, 42.32

Shakeology, $1028.89.

• 03/17/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 132.13
• 03/29/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 04/17/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 05/17/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 06/13/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 06/17/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 07/06/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 07/13/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 07/17/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64
• 08/06/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, 99.64

Team Beachbody Coach membership, $104.22.

Please note that you will remain a Team Beachbody Coach and billed the monthly $15.95 + tax (if applicable) cost for the Business Service Fee.

• 04/18/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37
• 05/18/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37
• 06/17/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37
• 07/06/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37
• 07/17/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37
• 08/05/16, PPL*BIZ SERVICE FEE 800-240-0913 CA, 17.37

Various credits, $314.41.

I am the kind of person who double-checks every transaction on my account. I did a few claims to the Customer Service that were rectified immediately. What if I had not inspected my bank statements?

• 03/18/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-207-0423 CA, -43.50
• 04/12/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, -129.95
• 06/06/16, PPL*TEAM BEACHBODY 800-470-7870 CA, -43.50
• 08/24/16, PPL*SHAKEOLOGY 800-470-7870 CA, -97.46

How much money did we make as affiliates for Beachbody

Let me think. If we take into account, what we spent, we are at loss. Erwan was purchasing the products (workout DVDs, etc.) through my account so that she was getting a commission out of it.

Commissions earned, $80:

• 05/26/16, DEPOSIT FROM TEAM BEACHBODY-EDI PYMNTS, 60.00
• 06/16/16, DEPOSIT FROM TEAM BEACHBODY-EDI PYMNTS, 20.00

I sold all of her DVDs. Minimalist at heart, I sell anything laying around the house that we don’t make use of. I have never sold as many things as fast as Beachbody DVDs! Which confirmed that the demand for Beachbody products was crazy high.

Examples:

• Shaun T Cize Dance Workout by Beachbody – Complete Set – $35,00
• 22 Minute hard corps by Beachbody – $20,00
• INSANITY Shawn T. Extreme Workout 10 Disc DVD – $44.89
• Les Mills Combat – Ultimate Warrior – by Beachbody – $25,00
• Cize Dance Workout by Beachbody – $32,00
• INSANITY, Cize, 21-Day Fix, 22 Minute hard corps, Les Mills Combat by Beachbody – $70
• 21-Day Fix, 2 DVDs and Shakeology shaker by Beachbody – $25
• 21-Day Fix Plyo Fix DVD by Beachbody – $12
• Autumn Calabrese’s FIXATE Cookbook – 21-Day Fix Recipes by Beachbody – $20,00
• Cize Terry Wristband $3.59

Wrap-up

I do believe you can make money by joining Beachbody’s affiliate program (becoming a coach). But it may take years before you get any return on investment. If you are passionate about what you do, if you genuinely create value for others as a Beachbody coach, then success will come. But you will have more likely spent thousands of dollars in Beachbody before reaching that point.

Another point of interest after breaking down and analyzing our figures is that commissions based on subscription are the highest. We spent over 1K in Shakeology while close to half of this in one-time purchases. What would you rather: a one-time commission of $100 or $20 per month for an unpredictable period? It is overlooked by so many people. More on this subject.