Episode 257: The Truth Behind MLMs with Tracy Coenen
The Divorce Survival Guide Podcast
Kate Anthony
4.4 • 574 Ratings
🗓️ 7 March 2024
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Forensic Accountant Tracy Coenen joins me for a conversation about the predatory nature of MLMs. In addition to investigating fraud for over 25 years, Tracy founded Pink Truth, a website that uncovers the problematic and damaging truth of multi-level marketing (MLM).
By and large, MLM schemes overwhelm and prey upon women, falsely promising entrepreneurship and financial freedom while making them more financially dependent on an abusive structure. In this episode, Tracy and I explore how MLMs masquerade as empowering ventures but function as wolves in sheep's clothing.
Featured topics:
- Tracy Coenen sheds light on the predatory tactics of multi-level marketing. (6:10)
- False promises about entrepreneurship: We discuss the facade MLMs portray that "you are starting a business of your own…" (14:49)
- Instead of empowering women, MLMs make them more financially dependent on an exploitative structure. (21:31)
- Tracy answers, "Why are women so drawn to MLMs? Why are women a good target for this?" (42:12)
Learn more about Tracy Coenen:
Tracy has been investigating fraud for more than 25 years, but she didn't always want to be a forensic accountant. With a dream of one day being a prison warden, Tracy went to Marquette University in Milwaukee, WI to get a criminology degree. A class on financial crime investigations reminded her how much she loved Encyclopedia Brown books as a kid. She continued her criminology degree, but added accounting and economics courses so she could become a CPA… and here Tracy is, finding money in cases of corporate fraud, high net worth divorce, and other financial shenanigans.
Resources & Links:
Phoenix Rising: A Divorce Empowerment Collective
Show notes:
https://kateanthony.com/podcast/episode-257-the-truth-behind-mlms-with-tracy-coenen/
TODAY'S EPISODE IS SPONSORED BY:
PRIMIS BANK
Get started navigating your new financial picture with Primis Bank. For terms and conditions, visit primisbank.com/dsg.
DISCLAIMER: THE COMMENTARY AND OPINIONS AVAILABLE ON THIS PODCAST ARE FOR INFORMATIONAL AND ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY AND NOT FOR THE PURPOSE OF PROVIDING LEGAL OR PSYCHOLOGICAL ADVICE. YOU SHOULD CONTACT AN ATTORNEY, COACH, OR THERAPIST IN YOUR STATE TO OBTAIN ADVICE WITH RESPECT TO ANY PARTICULAR ISSUE OR PROBLEM.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Divorce Survival Guide podcast, where we have open and honest conversations about co-parenting, separation, divorce, and the hardest question of all, should you stay or should you go. |
| 0:17.8 | I'm Kate Anthony, your divorce survival guide, and I'm here to help you navigate some of |
| 0:23.3 | the roughest waters you've ever swum in and answer some of your toughest questions. I've been to |
| 0:29.1 | hell and back, and now it's my mission in life to help you get to the other side of this process |
| 0:35.1 | with your sanity and your heart intact. |
| 0:41.4 | Hey, everyone. Welcome back. So before I get to today's episode with my dear friend Tracy |
| 0:50.2 | Conan, we're going to be talking about all things MLM. But before we get to that, |
| 0:59.9 | I want to talk a little bit about Phoenix Rising. And there are really a couple things that |
| 1:06.7 | questions that people have asked or sort of fears that people have expressed that I want to address. |
| 1:15.1 | So first of all, someone mentioned that they felt like because I have a Facebook group with over 17,000 women in it, |
| 1:25.4 | that Phoenix Rising would be full, would like hundreds of women, |
| 1:28.9 | and they wouldn't get their attention or their money's worth or whatever. |
| 1:33.9 | That could not be further from the truth. |
| 1:36.9 | This program currently has maybe 30 women in it, and not everyone shows up to every call. So so far, I don't think anyone has had an |
| 1:50.9 | issue with not getting the personalized attention that they feel that they need. So there's that. |
| 1:56.3 | This program does not have hundreds of women in it. I was going to say, I wish it did, but I don't, |
| 2:01.1 | actually. That's not the kind of program that I want to run. I really, really, really want to be able |
| 2:07.6 | to be accessible to as many women as possible, but also be able to serve them in a way that has |
| 2:16.4 | integrity to me. And that's really important to me. |
| 2:19.7 | The second thing I wanted to address is that people are concerned about the calls and when they |
| 2:25.5 | are and if they can make them and if they can't make them. And here's the deal. I have made the calls |
| 2:32.9 | at different times in different time zones. So there are two |
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