Multi-level marketing businesses have gained traction over the past few decades. Custom MLM software solutions are now used by most companies to increase operational efficiency. These platforms are packed with innovative features that automate MLM workflows to save time and enhance on-the-job productivity.
We are fortunate to have interviewed Mr. Gregory Kabitsky, CEO at MLM Soft, and learn more about his journey, mission, and long-term vision. A specialist in the domain of multi-level and affiliate marketing, MLM Soft has a growing base of renowned international clients. Mr. Gregory Kabitsky has led the company through a sea of change to emerge as a market leader with a distinct brand identity.
In Conversation with Mr. Gregory Kabitsky, CPO at MLM Soft
Here’s an excerpt from the interview:
A warm welcome from SoftwareSuggest Mr. Gregory Kabitsky. Our readers are keen to know what prompted you to create MLM Soft? Tell us about your journey so far.
Hello, and thank you for having me.
I’m in this business for almost 15 years, so it’s obviously not a spontaneous decision. I began with custom software development, and among our customers were different businesses, like construction, financial, and MLM as well.
Then, by providing custom software solutions for MLM businesses, we gained a lot of expertise, and in fact, by 2012, we became the number 1 software and consulting provider for MLM in Russia and Eastern Europe under the MLM-PRO trademark.
So MLM Soft project was a natural next step transforming our business from a service model to a product one. That’s important because by providing custom software, you’re basically providing software developing services, so you may only scale in a linear paradigm. The more customers you have, the more resources you need to hire. Finally, it becomes an endless race for hiring IT guys.
The idea of this new project was to transform the business to a pure product model. We only develop our product, the platform. Thus, the platform should be super customizable and flexible to allow us to deliver a final solution customized to meet various business requirements almost without any coding at all. This is a super scalable model, with obvious benefits for customers too.
So now we’re proud to offer the first cloud platform for multi-level and affiliate marketing.
What is your success mantra? Something you have followed personally that has helped you in your entrepreneurial journey
I’m not sure I have just one, probably a few in fact. What I believe will lead to success is a bunch of very simple thoughts.
First, if you failed it doesn’t automatically mean that the idea is bad, though sometimes it is. Don’t give up; probably, you just did something wrong. So just try it again. And again.
The second, most important though: the team is everything. Pay as much attention as you can to your hiring criteria, interviewing, and team development. It’s better to have fewer guys who are super talented and super expensive than a crowd of average people.
And the last thing to consider. In many cases to achieve success, you don’t need to be a pioneer. You don’t need to invent something nobody ever thought about in the past. Often just to make something better than others is quite enough. You’ll be surprised if you think about how many low-quality products and services we have in any market. Just do it right, just do it better than others, and that’s it.
What was your thought process behind the inception of MLM Soft?
It was quite simple consideration in fact. At that time we’ve already been number 1 in a small local market. The only possible next step is to step outside. We have to scale up.
Then, the only way to do it is to change the business model to a scalable one, which is a product model.
So it became obvious to my team and me. We have to create a great product for the market which we know very well, to gather all our experience and put it to that product design, to develop clear market positioning with obvious benefits for the customers. Let’s just do it.
What was the biggest obstacle that you faced while working towards MLM Soft’s growth, and how did you overcome it?
There was a lot. All of them as usual were connected with people.
To find the right guys, to create a true team out of them, it’s really hard. It takes years of failures and expenses. When you hire IT guys, you expect them to bring some expertise. The right thing is to hire guys who know much more than you. This makes your project stronger, as you get such leverage. On the other side, you should rely on their choices, in terms of technology, in terms of strategy. And sometimes, with the wrong people, it leads to failure.
On the other side, finding a key to your customers’ hearts isn’t as easy at all. Initially, you may probably think that you know what they need. In fact, it’s a long way of wrong suggestions, tryouts, negative feedback, over and over. But what you get finally is worth it.
What separates MLM Soft from its competitors?
Our business model, which is the only one we can choose, is at the same time our most important benefit.
On one side of the market, there are old big enterprise software providers (mostly US-based). They built their softback in the ninetieth, and their tech is mostly outdated. Their code is hard to maintain. So they are very expensive and aren’t flexible. If a customer wants to change something to his needs it’s painful, takes a lot of time, and is over-expensive.
On the other side, there are a lot of smaller companies all over the world, which basically don’t have a product at all (though they represent themselves as they have). They offer custom development using their previous projects’ experience and codebase. So they can build whatever you want but: they don’t offer expertise, so a customer has to know exactly what he wants; then, as it’s custom development, it takes more time to deliver and a lot of time to make it stable.
We solve both these problems by offering a highly customizable platform, which gives benefits of a stable out-of-the-box product, and custom development, 2 in 1:
First, it’s a ready-to-use product, with a lot of current customers, so it’s stable, it’s robust. It’s constantly improving (as we have the same code base for all users). And it can be delivered quickly. Thus we shorten our customers’ time to market and initial investments dramatically.
On the other hand, it’s customizable to any requirements, so basically, to change something takes just a few hours of setup and adjustments, not even coding. That’s why we can deliver our solution to customers from a wide spectrum of multi-level and affiliate marketing industries.
This is what we offer, and this is what our customers love about us.
How has Covid-19 impacted your business, and what is your strategy moving forward in the new normal?
You know, MLM is quite a unique industry. It constantly grows year over year for the past 50 years or so. So it grows when everyone grows. And it also grows when everyone falls. It’s because of the unique MLM model. MLM company is a kind of your own market which is relatively indifferent to external factors.
For example, during the Covid pandemic, many people lost their jobs. But where all those people went? At least some of them went to MLM, to find an extra income opportunity outside of the standard job market. So MLM is booming again.
On the other side, we got all these negative factors everyone is facing these days. Businesses, especially small enterprises, go out of the game, or at least cut off their expenses, or put their new plans on hold.
Speaking about our part in this story. What we provide is software to manage your MLM company, calculate commissions. We also provide an online office, or a back office, to MLM sales reps and affiliates. It’s integrated with e-commerce, so it basically makes it nice and easy to work from home.
And we really see how many businesses turn to MLM these days.
It’s hard times, and like all hard times, it’s not just a time of suffering but also a time of great opportunities.
What new and exciting updates can we expect from MLM Soft in the near future?
One of our key concepts is an open architecture. It means that we’re all about integration. We don’t try to fit all the features customers possibly need in our software. We only provide our core expertise, which is MLM. So our customers are free to choose any 3rd party solution to manage some routine operations, like inventory management, accounting, and so on.
So this is what to expect. More integration options, more built-in integrations, like e-commerce and website builders. So the best is yet to come.
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