Welcome to my doTerra review 2021!
doTerra claims that it is “formed with the mission of sharing therapeutic-grade essential oils with the world and provides its distributors a healthy compensation plan. For this, they bring the health professionals and business experts together to make this mission a reality.”
No matter what the doTerra claims, the best way to validate its claim is to read the impartial reviews on search engines.
This is why I must praise you for taking your time to do your own research about doTerra.
Let me be entirely transparent with you; I’m not related to doTerra in any form.
Instead, I’m here to disclose the reality behind doTerra and what it can really provide for you.
Is it really that simple for doTerra to satisfy its promises? Is it worth your time? And most importantly, is doTerra a scam or pyramid scheme?
That’s all I will be showing in this review.
So let’s begin;
Product Name: doTerra
Founder: David Stirling
Product Type: Health and Wellness Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) Company
Price: $35 to join + $100/month Autoship
Best For: People who love MLM business
Summary: doTerra is an MLM company that sells essential oil to people using direct selling method instead of mass marketing. The company also provides a lucrative compensation plan to its members. The cost to join is $35 as a registration fee and after that $100 per month to buy products to be eligible for its compensation plan.
Rating: 50/100
Verdict: No
What is doTerra?
doTerra launched in 2008, and the person behind this company is David Stirling. The name “doTerra” is a Latin word and simply means – Gift Of The Earth.
The sole company aim is to provide essential oils to the people that are purely distilled from plants.
The first oil was introduced in April 2008, and it is composed of 25 single oils and ten blends.
Since that time, doTerra has added several other single oils, oil blends, nutritional products, spa, and weight management products based on essential oil technologies and comprehensive wellness philosophy.
Rather than working on mass marketing, the company is operating the system of direct selling. Therefore, it is an MLM company.
Though the company is not decades old, yet it has witnessed significant growth since its inception.
The Company is operating in the essential oils industry, and the most dominant name that comes to my mind is Young Living, which was formed in 1993.
Every MLM company claims too much for their products and business plans, in reality, the sole purpose is to recruit people for recruiting others.
This truth is not fit only with the doTerra; rather whole MLM companies face this blame as well. See Nerium, Le-vel Thrive, and Arbonne, to name a few.
doTerra Product Line
Though doTerra came out as an essential oil company, they have expanded their product line to include other areas like weight management, personal care, supplements and many more.
So, let’s look a few important products in each area;
- Essential Oils – Includes both single and proprietary blends. Oil types are; basil, black pepper, cassia, clove, cypress, douglas fir and many more….
- doTERRA On Guard Products – Hand wash, laundry detergent, mouthwash, soft gels, etc.
- doTERRA Breathe – Respiratory drops, vapor stick, and respiratory touch.
- Personal Care – It includes products of skin care, body care, and hair care products.
- Supplements – It ranges to children’s supplements, digestive health supplements, specialized supplements, daily fruit, and vegetable supplements.
- Weight Management – It includes metabolic gum, trim kit, trim shake, v shake, new you kit and soft gels.
Oil Extraction Process
Let’s look at the glimpse of their oil extraction process;
i). Harvesting
After performing a series of tests, the company discovered that where the plant is grown is a primary factor in discovering the therapeutic quality of the essential oil.
doTERRA selected farmers carefully who have mastered their art in locations where plants have been grown traditionally for many years.
ii). Distilling
doTERRA normally uses two types of essential oil extraction: steam distillation and expression. Both of these processes are organic methods of oil extraction.
Steam distillation is the widely used method of extracting aromatic compounds (essential oil) from a plant. During this process, steam moves through the plant material.
Both heated steam and gentle pressure make the essential oil to be discharged from tiny sacs.
As the vapor mixture passes through a condenser and cools, it produces a layer of oil and a layer of water. The essential oil lifts to the top and is isolated from the floral water and collected.
The expression is sometimes also referred to as “cold pressed,” and it does not involve heat. In this process, oil is obtained from the product under mechanical pressure.
doTERRA applies the expression to extract all of its citrus oils, such as Lime, Wild Lemon, Orange, Bergamot, and Grapefruit, from the rind.
iii). CPTG Quality Testing
doTerra is following its own testing process calling it as Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade (CPTG).
The CPTG process verifies that there are no combined fillers, synthetic ingredients, or toxic contaminants in the essential oils that would reduce their effectiveness.
It includes the following tests:
- Organoleptic testing
- Microbial testing
- Gas chromatography
- Mass spectrometry
- Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR)
- Chirality testing
- Isotopic analysis
- Heavy metal testing
What Are People Saying about Their Products?
Thought they have a lengthy approach to oil extractions and claiming that essential oils are extracting without adding any toxic chemical, but the biggest criticism on this process is that their CPTG Quality Testing is not accredited or approved by any authority.
Moreover, a vast majority of people are claiming about essential oils over pricing, and there are better brands available in the market that is of better quality.
How to Make Money from doTerra?
Though doTerra is presenting itself a quality essential oil producer in the market, the truth is people join it just to make money using their compensation plan. That’s how every MLM company portrays it in front of people.
The only way to earn from doTerra is to recruit other people. That’s all!
However, to get started you have to pay a $35 fee as a registration. After that, you are called as “Wellness Advocates” a term doTerra used to denote distributors.
After that, the company requires from its advocates to spend at least $100 on its product to be entitled to a sales commission. So, for the first month, the total amount you need to pay is $135 and later on $100/month.
I believe it’s too much for the starters. They somehow pay the $35 registration fee but purchasing $100 worth of products every month weigh too much for them.
Even after that, the only way for them to make a commission is by recruiting other people which is the toughest thing to do.
doTerra Compensation Plan
Once you have started after paying the above fees, now there are four ways to earn from doTerra compensation plan;
- Retail Profit – You get a 25% commission on purchase made by your retail customers. If your referral purchases $100/month you will get $25/month for this purchase as long as your referral will continue this. (Pretty straightforward)
- Fast Start Bonus – For the first two months, this bonus allows new distributors to earn higher percentage commissions from their first three levels of downlines (Level 1: 20%, Level 2: 10%, Level 3: 5%). But each enroller must have a 100 PV Loyalty Rewards to participate.
- Power of Three Bonus – This is when you recruit three people in your downlines, and they also recruit three people each and so on to the third level along with complying additional guidelines, it will reward you a cash bonus of $50, $250, $1,500 respectively.
- Unilevel Organizational Bonus – Up to 7 levels deep, you can earn residual income in your doTERRA MLM business. The deeper you go, the higher the percentage you will earn.
Though the plan is much more complicated than I have written, that’s why I am sharing with you a video guide here.
Don’t waste you time in MLM companies, Click here to see my #1 recommend program to earn a full-time income from home!
Pros & Cons:
The Good
1. BBB Accredited
doTerra is Better Business Bureau accredited business having A+ ratings. However, there are 21 complaints registered with the BBB.
That’s a large number of complaints but very common for MLM sites.
2. Growing Company
doTerra is a growing company as it deals in essential oils. The essential oil is a growing market that has seen tremendous growth over the years.
Let’s look at the image taken from Google Trends over its growth;
This growth is as a result of;
- Increase demands in our kitchens
- More direct sales companies are promoting them which causes more product awareness to people
That’s why when we look at the growth of doTerra over Google trends then it also shows significant growth over the years.
3. You Can Make Money
Despite it is an MLM Company, still you can make money from it. As the company’s entire focus is on essential oils, you can find a targeted audience who love their products.
If you look at people over the internet, many people are praising their products.
The Bad
1. Recruiting, Recruiting and Only Recruiting
The only way to make money from doTerra is to recruit other people. I know this is not an easy task but if you know how to do it, start recruiting today.
The issue is not with the recruiting but how to do it is the main issue. Because the people join in the middle of the chain has no clue how to move forward. As most of the times;
- There is a lack of communication from top to bottom.
- Many Directors and Managers lack the management skills necessary to lead teams.
- Lack of leadership in middle management makes it nearly impossible for a project to move forward efficiently.
2. Expensive Startup Cost
This is also a big issue with MLM companies. They charge you a high amount at the start with the guarantee of big commissions.
doTerra also charges you $35 as a registration fee and $100 per month to be qualified for several commissions.
3. Expensive Products but Average Quality
I have been part of much renowned multi-level marketing (MLM) companies in the past, and it was challenging for me to convince people to join those companies. You should expect this case with the doTerra as well.
Simply, on one side the products are costly as paralleled to its rivals’ prices and on another side, they don’t provide value.
This problem doesn’t lie only with doTerra, but if you look at other popular multi-level marketing companies like Kyani, Amway, Zurvita, My Lead System Pro and they all are facing this issue as well.
Due to this extra margin charged by those multi-level marketing businesses, it allows them to make a cut from this margin and offer well-paid compensation plan to their members.
That’s for sure; people don’t join them due to their products, rather their only purpose of joining those sites is to earn money by hiring other people.
Products are crap; this makes hard for their members to convince other people to buy them.
4. Limited Earning Potential
Nevertheless, the time and effort you put in doTerra, in the end, you only have few bucks in your hand.
That’s correct….
Though doTerra is one of the reliable MLM sites in this industry, still this issue is with it.
You can get a paycheck of $70 to $100 per month. Even for that $70 to $100, you need to spend 3 to 5 hours daily. That’s a lot of work.
If you look at the rank structure in doTerra, they are 12 in numbers;
Wellness advocates, Manager, Director, Executive, Elite, Premier, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Blue Diamond, and Presidential Diamond.
In doTerra, people holding wellness advocates to the premier ranks are called Builders, and people from silver to the presidential diamond ranks are called Leaders.
Majority of its members falls in the category of builders, and there average earning per annum is $1000. It means less than $100 per month.
These are not my claims and if you think otherwise then just give me one example from sites like It Works, Perfectly Posh, Wakaya Perfection, to name a few that have a success rate greater than this.
If you think doTerra can replace your 9 to 5 jobs and earn you a consistent income, believe me, that’s not going to be happening.
Honestly speaking, I am not going to waste my time on such places for earning like this and I don’t want/like to waste your time too.
Is doTerra a Scam?
doTerra is not a scam because it is still a real company that provides its members with legitimate business opportunity. Like most MLM businesses firms, they have their upsides and downsides.
The Company deals some good products that are also in demand by people. doTerra also allows them to take part in its business model and earn a commission after selling its products to other people.
Despite legitimate, I don’t recommend you to begin this as an income opportunity. You cannot foresee much from an MLM platform; they get closed anytime.
Can doTerra become your cash cow and provide you with the lifestyle that it promises? I wouldn’t think so, but that’s just my opinion.
There are cheaper options out there when it comes to making money online.
Want to Earn a Full-time Income From Home?
Is doTerra a Pyramid Scheme?
Before looking at whether doTerra is a Pyramid Scheme or not, let’s first understand what is a pyramid scheme.
Some multi-level marketing (MLM) companies run like pyramid schemes, and people often confuse legitimate multi-level marketing companies with pyramid schemes.
Legitimate MLM, unlike pyramid schemes:
- Have a real product to sell.
- If the cash you earn is based on your selling to the public, it may be a legitimate multilevel marketing plan.
When we look at doTerra, it offers good products in the form of essential oils and the products also have a good market. That’s why there is significant growth occurs over the years.
Final Verdict:
Though doTerra is a legit MLM company, I recommend you to put your focus on your own business rather than acting for someone else behalf.
Including doTerra, MLM sites have costly items, and it gets challenging to sell to other people.
That’s where I recommend my favorite business model called as, Affiliate marketing, which is the only method I recommend to make money online.
Let’s look at the reasons why I prefer affiliate marketing over MLM;
- Unlike doTerra, you don’t have to recruit anyone to make money
- It gives you control and ownership that doTerra doesn’t
- You don’t need to be involved in face to face marketing
- You have the privilege to promote any products you want
- It’s Free to get started
Don’t put so much effort on doTerra and other similar MLM businesses as if the doTerra company gets closed, all of your efforts will get vain, and you need to start again from scratch, while in affiliate marketing if a Company shut by FTC, you can choose other to replace the older one.
If you want to discover what affiliate marketing is, I urge seeing Wealthy Affiliate as my #1 recommendation.
Sign up as a free member and start your journey here.
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What’s your thoughts on my doTerra review 2021 and if there is any issue in your mind, please ask me in the comment section.
