The last thing you want to do is become part of a multilevel system that is, in reality, an illegal pyramid scheme. Each new participant pays for a chance to advance to the top and profit from payments of others who might join later. Both MLM and pyramids have multilevel payment systems, but that is where the similarity ends. Network marketing is a legal, ethical manner of doing business.
Pyramids are illegal, fraudulent con games.
In MLM, you are a legitimate seller of a product or service and business opportunity. In a pyramid, you are a crook. If there is no legitimate product or service being sold, but only the opportunity itself, chances are, the promotion is a pyramid scheme. Products that are sold at inflated prices . Sometimes pyramid promoters try to mask their true intent by selling a product.