An Analysis of AGLOCO Business Model

AGLOCO

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few months, you should know about AGLOCO by now. It is not really different from those [paid to surf](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paid_to_surf) schemes that were very popular around the late 90s. Their promises are quite simple:

* You sign up, install the ViewBar, and surf the web as usual. The ViewBar will show you ads while you surf the web.
* You earn commission based on how long you spend your time on the web.
* You could convert your earnings into AGLOCO shares.
* You can refer your friends to use AGLOGO, and earn more.

At least, that’s how they are trying to tell us. In reality, they don’t have anything to offer to their users at the moment.

**The shift of burden**

First, let’s analyze the AGLOGO cash flow.

AGLOCO cash flow analysis

Unwilling to repeat their previous mistakes with [AllAdvantage](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alladvantage), AGLOCO does not use fixed rate payment scheme. With fixed rate payment, AllAdvantage was in disadvantage (no pun intended) when faced with user abuse. They ended up paying more than they are receiving and quickly exhausted their capital.

AGLOCO introduces the concept of shares. From what I understand, users will earn the amount of money in proportion to the amount AGLOCO is receiving. From the diagram above, A will always be greater than B, users will get a proportion from what AGLOCO get from advertisers. That would mean as long as AGLOGO has sufficient users and advertisers, it should never go bankrupt.

But this would also mean AGLOCO is shifting the burden to its users. When some users are abusing the system, each legitimate user will get less than they are supposed to get. For example let’s say a user is abusing the system by creating several fake users with simulated browsing habits. Without knowing the abuse, AGLOCO will have to pay the abusive user, costing its legitimate users real money.

Unlike AllAdvantage, AGLOCO doesn’t have any real incentive to combat abuse. When an abuse occurs (and it certainly will occur), users will suffer, but never AGLOCO. The only thing missing from AGLOCO as a result of abuse is the accurate number of real active users. AGLOCO needs to present this number to its potential advertiser, but it would be an easy matter for them to simply offset the approximate proportion of abuse, rather than taking serious steps in combating abuse.

Assuming the same rate of income and the same amount of users, AGLOGO users, collectively, will get much less than what they would get from the late AllAdvantage.

**The referral game theory**

AGLOCO will reward a user who gets others join AGLOCO. With the assumption every user surfs the web at least 5 hours a month, the scheme works like this:

* When user A joins AGLOCO, he will be rewarded 5 shares/month.
* When user A gets user B to join under his name, user A will be rewarded 25% of user B shares, which is 1.25 shares/month. User B will still get his full 5 shares/month.
* When user B refers user C, both user A and user B will be rewarded 25% of user C shares, which is 1.25 shares/month each. User C will still get 5 shares/month.
* This will continue until 6th level of referral.

From the point of view of a user, it is obvious that in his/her best interest, he/she must get as many people as possible to join AGLOCO under his/her name. But what’s the situation from the point of view of a user who is about to join AGLOCO?

By joining under another AGLOCO user, AGLOCO will need to issue 5 shares for him, and an additional up to 6*1.25=7.5 shares for his uplines. On the other hand, by joining without following a referral link, AGLOCO will only need to issue 5 shares just for him.

It is clear that by joining through a referral link, a user will get much less in proportion than he would get without following a referral link. If anyone happens to join through a referral link, there are several reasons that I can think of:

* Ignorance. They didn’t pay enough attention to the details, or doesn’t know how to remove any trace of reference.
* Abuse. Puppet users joining under a real AGLOCO user.
* Charity. A user want to donate a part of his share to another user.

Aside from charity purposes, there’s no way a well informed user would willingly join AGLOCO under another AGLOCO user.

If a user has already registered under another user, I would suggest to cancel the membership, remove cookies, and then re-register again.

**Is AGLOCO scam or not?**

AGLOCO web site has been very careful not to promise anything. I repeat, they never promise anything, at all. All they do is making these [non promises](http://www.agloco.com/web/guest/shareandcash):

> As AGLOCOâ„¢ grows and the company generates positive cash flow, we will be distributing the excess cash to Members and shareholders of the company.

Nobody, not even AGLOCO itself, knows when that will happen, if ever.

What claimed on other blogs and sites are different matter. Anybody making extravagant claims about AGLOCO being the next big thing is probably just trying to defraud unsuspecting users into joining AGLOCO under their name, and thus getting potential extra revenue at the expense of these users’ potential revenue. Some of them even tell us as far as that each AGLOCO user will make hundreds of dollars every months in average. This is obviously a false claim since AGLOCO itself has never made such claims.

AGLOGO web site has the [Blogs around the world](http://www.agloco.com/web/guest/blogarticle) page where they list several said blogs and web sites. However, again, they are very careful not to make any claim of accuracy regarding these third party sites.

> Please note that blog content changes frequently, therefore we do not endorse these blogs nor can we vouch for the accuracy of the information they contain.

**AGLOCO viability**

Having said that, I don’t think AGLOCO will be a worthy source of income for its users. Here’s how.

Let’s suppose advertisers pays $100000 for ad placements to AGLOCO. These advertisers will certainly expect they get pretty much the same amount of value from AGLOCO users. If they don’t get a similar value to what they are spending, they will certainly bring their business elsewhere. These values could be in the form of marketing leads or simply brand recognition.

Somehow I doubt that handing people pennies to get them remember and buy their product is a viable marketing model. And let’s not forget that users will only get a fraction from the amount paid by advertisers.

Of course there’s a possibility that a few of these users will get a substantial amount of revenue. In the future, they will post photos of their ‘hard earned’ checks and claim this as a proof that “It works! AGLOCO really works!” Then people with their collective [Valence effect](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valence_effect) will flock and believe the proof. However, the observant among us will identify that this revenue can only come from the cut imposed on his/her numerous downlines’ revenue.

Because of this, the massive spam it generates, I would suggest staying away from AGLOCO and save your time.

**More Reading**

* [AGLOCO Will Not Make Money Online! Ever!](http://www.cashquests.com/2007/02/agloco-will-not-make-money-online-ever.html)
* [What Everyone Ought to Know About Agloco](http://www.tradersnarrative.com/what-everyone-ought-to-know-about-agloco-744.html)

61 comments

  1. Teman saya bilang ini bukan spam dan sudah dapat earning dari situ. Sejauh mana kebenarannya saya terus terang kurang tahu. Baiknya memang wait and see dulu. :)

  2. Ada bagusnya juga nulis artikel seperti ini… Jadi Google Adwords-nya muncul dengan pilihan “keyword” yg bid-nya tinggi :”>:d Kan lumayan juga kalo banyak yg ngeklik :d/:-\”

  3. Oooo begitu to? Pahamlah aku sekarang, makasih sudah menulis ini mas.

    Sebenarnya emang Algoco itu bukan scam ya, tapi bbrp usernya menyebabkan scam? Ya berarti layak dicoba, kalau ada waktu luang :D

  4. #2:

    All right. I must admit: I’ve been living under a rock for the last few months,

    living under a rock or you got an uber powerful spam filter

  5. #6:

    Sebenarnya emang Algoco itu bukan scam ya, tapi bbrp usernya menyebabkan scam?

    keliatannya bukan scam, dia gak pernah buat janji apa2 :)

  6. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few months, you should know about AGLOCO by now.

    true, since i never heard of it till now

  7. Good analysis. Agloco is definitely tailor made for the intellectually incurious.

    The other important factor is that although many ‘top gun’ Agloco recruiters boast about their massive downline, only a few of them will actually download the toolbar.

    And of those, even fewer will actually use it continously. From the numbers trickling in now it sees that the ratio is 6:100 accumulated hours:downline

    The whole thing is a farce but it will take months to fully play out.

  8. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few months, you should know about AGLOCO by now.

    Wew, nyindir nih :D
    Saya memang baru dengar sekarang, karena saya selalu menghindari yang kayak beginian. Udah kenyang ditipu.

  9. Setahu saya belum ada yang pernah dapet cek dari Agloco. Tunggu saja mas Pri sampe ada laporan yang mendapatkan cek, then we’ll know program ini beneran apa engga :d

    Saya sendiri sih skeptis…

  10. Hah, paid-to-surf muncul lagi ya? Kok bisa ya? Padahal yang dulu-dulu sudah jatuh karena terlalu banyak abuse.

  11. Dulu (duluuuuu) tahun 2002 pernah mencoba ikut program paid-to-surf (lupa namanya). Sama, dulu juga diharuskan meng-install toolbar di IE yang menyita tampilan kira-kira setinggi 60px. Sambil browsing, akan muncul iklan-iklan di tempat yang dikuasai oleh toolbar tersebut.

    Di toolbar itu ada animasi anak kecil berjalan yang harus diklik setiap beberapa menit sekali. Kalau tidak di klik si anak akan tertidur dan hitungan komisi akan dihentikan. Untuk menghalangi abuse sih. Tapi akhirnya malah kita jadi tidak tahan. Sedikit-sedikit minta di klik. Browsing jadi tidak nyaman. Dan ketika jumlah komisinya diintip, kok sedikit sekali hasilnya. Ndak sumbut, mas :(

    Dulu program paid-to-surf jumlahnya buanyak, sampai muncul website-website yang khusus membahas program paid-to-surf dan menjadi ajang pamer cek. Seingat saya, dulu pernah ada orang yang memamerkan cek sebesar US$ 700. Tapi kalau dipikir-pikir jumlah sebesar itu hanya bisa dia dapatkan dengan ‘mengkaryakan’ sekian ratus orang untuk menjadi downline-nya. Orang lain browsingnya jadi tidak nyaman, dianya yang dapat duit. MLM deh :d

    Paid-to-surf hanya bisa berjaya di jaman bubble dulu. Kalau sekarang sih jelas tidak mungkin lah.

  12. gw ud ikut juga, lumayan ud bs download viewbarnya statistiknya sih ok, kalo hasilnya ya mudah2 an bener ntar :d, namanya juga usaha…. :-\”

  13. gw jg join under-the-rock community club ah… Blum pernah denger perusahaan agloco ini…. :P

    payah nih.. gw kurang gaul…. :(

  14. Salam kenal, mas Priyadi.
    Just curious about this post:-? …apa ini semua orisinil hasil pemikiran mas Pri sendiri atau copy-paste dari berbagai resources?
    No offense ya :)>- , saya cuma kebetulan baca frase pembukanya yang beneran eye-catching “..Unless you’ve been living under a rock ..” jadi inget kata-kata yang sama di sini, post yang membahas hal yang sama dengan post ini…
    Cuma kebetulan saja pastinya, yang kebetulan juga bisa meningkatkan traffic reader dari dalam dan luar negri :-?

  15. tentang #30, saya sudah duga, coz frasa ‘under a rock’ itu janggal banget, dimana saat baca dugaan saya maksud mas pri ‘under/in the rock-age’.. hmm… kalaupun benar, seenggaknya bukan sekedar ‘kupipes’, tapi ‘kupipes-modivai’

    tapi bagaimanapun saya rasa mas pri yang paling update tentang info ini di indo..jadi link2 lain bahan referensi tulisan ini belum sempet di-track ama kawan2 blogger lain. mungkin mas ryosaeba punya ide? secara mas ryo juga sebagai auditor content ;)

    mas pri, keep the good posts!

  16. Saya ndesit, kadung jadi true believer dari Priyadi.

    Jadi kalau suatu saat Pri bilang sebuah model bisnis itu menguntungkan dan layak adposi, pasti saya ikut. :D

    Ayoh Pri, terus lakukan pencerahan! :D

  17. dulu sempet nulis ttg ini di blog saya lama2 stlh dilihat2 lagi.. kayaknya malah bikin tambah males ngelihat agloco (apalagi tuh ada versi indo-nya)..

    gak ada konten, gak ada aplikasi yg menarik, isinya cuma jualan referral.. berharap dapet duit.. Skema bisnis yg gak masuk di akal..

    jadi malu stlh ikutan.. mungkin akan lain halnya kalo nama sitenya adalah agloco.google.com (hehe.. kalo ini, dijamin sahamnya akan untung)

  18. SEtahu saya belum ada yang dapat chek dari Agloco. ViewBarnya saja baru bisa didownload. Belum ada pengumuman jelas kapan chek akan mulai dikirim.
    Kalau SCAM kayaknya tidak. Tapi memang ada member yang tetap ngotot SPAM untuk promosi.
    Pendiri Agloco merupakan founder AllAdvantage.com dulu.
    Bagi yang skeptis bisa coba dulu dan dapatkan informasi yang lengkap dari mereka. Gak ada paksaan ikut Agloco sama seperti program Google Adsense ada Affiliate Marketing(sistem penjualan berbasis komisi) lainnya

  19. Wekekkee. New program at new era.
    Anything could possibly make money.
    It’s just should happen at the right time and placement.

  20. Saya juga mulai ikutan, agloco bisa sukses kalo banyak membernya, kalo ga salah sebulan dibates 5 jam jadi penambahan jamnya tergantung dari banyak membernya. mybe

  21. Dah capek di tawarin beginian …
    Kemaren sempet mo ikutan sech ,,,
    Tapiiiiiiii akhirnya males …
    Mending ngerjain yang laen aja dech ,,,
    Sekalian nunggu perkembangannya aja …

  22. Semua artikel disini sungguh TIDAK BERMUTU! Isinya hanya menjelekkan orang lain. Kamu adalah masalah bagi Cyber World, Priyadi KEPARAT!

  23. agloco yach, absen dulu ach, soalnya banyak yang bilang Scam :((. tapi ada juga yang bilang bayar. jadi pusing sendiri :-? :-?, mendingan yang pasti-pasti aja dech

  24. Sape tau bisa kaya mendadak gara-gara ikutan agloco. Sambil surfing pasang viewbar, gak ada salahnya dunk….:-?

  25. PRIYADI AJA DI PERCAYA, DI ATUCH CUMAN BISA BICARA, CARI SENSASI DAN KONTROVERSI BIAR BLOGNYA RAME

  26. The real business model of Agloco is probably as follows:

    * Using a pyramid-like concept, a large number of members will be recruited; Agloco envisages between 1 and 10 million members. Recruitment bonuses are not paid in cash, but in “units”/”shares” with vague promises of large profits some unspecified time in the future.

    * The members surf advertisements on the internet and generate a small income per surfing hour to the company (which becomes quite much money if there are several million members), but the members are not paid any money; They only receive “units”, with vague promises of large profits on these “shares” sometime in the future, “when the company becomes profitable”.

    * The income from the members is used to pay inflated salaries to the managers/owners of Agloco

    * After 1 – 2 years (or when many dissatisfied members start asking questions about when the promised large profits on the shares will appear) the management will let Agloco go the same way as AllAdvantage and the rest of the paid-to-surf companies from 1999-2000; The company is run into bankruptcy or shut down, with the explanation that: “Unfortunately, the expenses of the company were larger than the revenues!”

    * In the end, the members will be left with a heap of worthless shares in a bankrupt or shut down Agloco, as “compensation” for their advertisement surfing and recruitment efforts (but with no money).
    The owners/management, on the other hand, will have enjoyed being paid high salaries and commissions for a couple of years, and can retire from Agloco as wealthy men.

    In short, the probable business concept of Agloco can be summarized as:
    Get a large number of people to work for you without being paid, by promising them large profits in the future.
    Then pocket the revenue from their efforts yourself!

  27. ya saya sih sudah Join….Member sudah mencapai 678 member sampai saat ini, Jumlah hours sudah sekitar 123 hours, tapi Check emang belum nerima sih….Tidak terlalu berharap tapi tidak ada salahnya ikutan..(kalu REJEKI kan nggak kemana…hehehheheh (Ngomong2 Mas PRIYADI dah ikutan Daftar belum ya???

    Kalu belum boleh tuh Daftar melalui BLOG saya yang ini…

    http://www.aglocoonline.blogspot.com

    Ini “NYEPAM” apa nggak ya???

  28. gini aja intinya kalian semua yang uda ikut uda pernah ada yang dapet duitnya blom??, apa lagi yang uda sampe ratusan member, yang penting ada bukti dulu and itu benenr2x nyata, toh dari dulu blom ada bukti,buktinya wa uda dapet 24 member di agloco tapi mana duidnya padahal wa uda ikutan 3 bulan,argg…..bohong.. lah…
    x(x(x(x(x(

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