22 Comments

Zibus.com – Drop Shipper Or “Grey” Affiliate Marketing Business?

Apr 7, 2006
by

So you tell me? Is this business model “grey” or legit? I was recently informed of a website named Zibus, tagged as “The World’s Online Dropshipper”.

Update: I have procured a copy of the merchants in Zibus. If you are a merchant and wish to see if you’re included, please contact me.

Here’s their company line:

Zibus offers a turnkey drop ship service through which entrepreneurs can sell over 35 million products on eBay or their own eCommerce websites. Zibus has partnered directly with nearly 1,000 of the world’s largest suppliers and manufacturers like Target, Nordstrom, Gap, Eddie Bauer and more to provide an exclusive drop ship opportunity to those who are serious about making a substantial income selling online without the standard headaches of purchasing and stocking your own inventory and dealing with merchandise shipping and returns. 100% of our suppliers will drop ship with no extra fees.

So they are a drop shipper then right? Not so fast, upon further investigation, I was able to figure out that the model actually works like this, unless I am mistaken, so if you own Zibus, feel free to chime in and correct me.

1. You pay up to $5k to have “the availability” of having those 1,000 plus merchants products to sell. Here’s a sample list of “dealers”.

2. You browse the “dealer network” offerings and pick which products you want to sell on your own site or eBay. Mind you, you don’t actually get code to put on your site or eBay, you grab a photo and create your own product listing. Note: If you sell on your own store, you do not use an affiliate link, you’re actually selling the product yourself and taking the money.

This is where it gets tricky.

3. So you put your “product” on eBay and auction it off above the price it was listed at. Then, after it’s sold, you go back to your Zibus network and click on the link to take you to the merchant site, buy the product and have it shipped the buyer direct. (That’s drop shipping?)

So what you’ve actually done here is sell a product you never owned or had a right to sell, then went back to the Zibus admin, clicked on the Zibus affiliate link and bought the product from the merchant, effectively giving Zibus the affiliate commission, of which he passes a piece back to you? That’s my understanding.

So, dear reader, here are some questions for you.

- Is this ethical?
- Is this legal?
- Does Zibus have the right to represent their merchant/affiliate relationship as a “drop ship” relationship?
- Will the merchants care? If you’re a merchant on this list, do you know about it?
- Will the networks care? As far as I can tell it’s mostly CJ and LS merchants

I was able to procure a jump link from the network as it is given to a Zibus signup.

http://dealer.zibus.com/jumpMerchant.cfm?SRMID=400

- Affiliate link to Autobarn.com

http://dealer.zibus.com/jumpMerchant.cfm?SRMID=403

- Affiliate link to a dead CJ product

http://dealer.zibus.com/jumpMerchant.cfm?SRMID=487

- Affiliate link to Coffeecup.com

Look for merchants on your own, just change the 3 digits at the end of the url string.

Here’s more about their Dealer Network.

Zibus only offers its products through an exclusive Dealer Network. Doing so protects each one of our product Dealers and eliminates market saturation, which can quickly eliminate any opportunity to make money if too many people have access to the same wholesale products. Our philosophy is that you get what you pay for. Yes, there are “drop ship” companies who charge minimal setup fees, but they also give you generic products with little to no profit margins. We work directly with the world’s largest suppliers of brand name products. Those who become Dealers will be among the elite of the internet.

Update as I was writing this piece, a quick Google search found these links:

Scam.com report

Better Business Bureau report

eBay forum link on Zibus

I repeat, if I have the facts wrong, I will be more than glad to correct them. Please add your thoughts in a comment below, or if you’re a merchant who wants to anonymously tell me something, give me a skype or aol IM (in my sidebar).

Filed under: Affiliate Marketing
  • Mike Hyland

    Shame on you Jim for being so blinded by greed you'd think this one was anything but a scam from jump street. Do you even have the vagest idea of the requirements to become an authorized dealer/reseller for one of those Major protected brand companies? Many Brands shown at http://www.zibus.com/HowItWorks/2.cfm have turned down Walmart and Target's request to get authorized as a multi-million dollar stocking reseller.

    Do all the Revenews readers a favor and report this phoney front drop shipper to the actual merchant mangement. Approaching those with AM's (dumber then victims of Blond Jokes) is not the route to take as they think doing business with eXact Advertising and Direct Revuenue would enhance their Brand image.

    What idea do you have on the back burner for enabling those, who buy into the hype of getting rich using dime a dozen drop shipping scammers, blindling your reality?

  • http://www.revenews.com Jim Kukral

    I have never understood you Mike. Your ramblings make no sense to me, never have, never will. You act as if I am endorsing this company, rather than posing questions about them as a responsible, professional.

    I know I'm no journalist, but perhaps you need to understand it is not my style to simply start calling someone a fish, even if they are a fish. I'd rather let the reader take the information and make their judgement.

    Blinded by greed? Me? How? You lost me at at blinded. Anyone else decifer what Mike is getting at? And I'm disapointed in you actually, no mention of an "ad-whore" anywhere? You're slipping, get Charlie to post.

  • http://www.ecomcity.com Mike Hyland

    Jim your thead title, and my quick investigation, proved to me there is no GREY area to this scam. This was the work of a cyber criminal mindset combining MLM with the lure of selling restricted brands under the guise of special drop shipping ,reseller priced, agreements with those merchants. That promise and ebiz plan was a BS phishing scheme from jump street. This was a BLACK HAT snatch and grab game ripe for immediate launch with any greed driven unethical affiliate network.

    Your expertise and network background would be better used to find out which slimy CPA lead network would drive suckers to this money trap…. and report that here for all to ponder.

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    Zibus is a THIEF and Misrepresents Merchant Brands.

    Lets start with THIEF.

    I did my own research on this issue as I originally thought Zibus was another CatalogueCity. If some of you do not remember CatalogueCity they are an Affiliate for many networks, they were one of the first to integrate datafeeds. As datafeeds were scares in those days, CatalogueCity had the advantage over there affiliate peers. They came up with an excellent idea to become a merchant at CJ consolidating their datafeeds. As a merchant CatalogueCity offered there "Compiled Feed" in the same manner a merchant would. The idea was simply, as an affiliate you did not have to join all the other program in many different networks CC would provide them all for you in a neat package and take a portion of your commissions. Pretty nifty idea and it has worked to there advantage.

    Zibus is a completely different animal.

    Zibus is doing the same thing as CatalogueCity but charging you $5K to join there special drop shipping program. They are stating they have the low down on Drop shipping. Not only do they have 1000's of company's at their access but also claim they can provide you with everything you need to become a professional drop shipper.

    I have access to their drop shipping merchants list, I will not post it here but they are ALL in the affiliate networks, which are provided to anyone for FREE.

    On to Misrepresenting A Merchants Brand.

    I called many of the merchants on the list and all stated emphatically they are not drop shippers nor do they have any special deal with Zibus.

    My conclusion:

    Zibus is a CatalogueCity with a twist, the twist is instead of joining CJ for free, join Zibus and pay them $5K and while your at it give them a percentage of every sale you make.

    1. Zibus is lying about having a list of drop shippers. (The list is affiliate merchants)
    2. Zibus is misrepresenting a Branded Company such as Wal-Mart, CallawayGolfPreowned, etc. as drop shippers. (After many calls it's nothing but a whopper lie)
    3. Zibus requires you click their links to purchase items for drop shipping from there site, make sure you change the shipping address to the customer address, then report the sale made to Zibus. (UHM AFFILIATE SCAMMING)

    I am uncertain as to the legal ramifications concern this company, but with many calls to these supposed drop shipping company's (eyes roll) they will find out soon enough.

    I smell a big EGG FART called Zibus!

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    I do wonder how many merchants care that someone is spending 5K to have access to their special drop-shipping program through Zimbus?

    You would think the merchant would want a cut of this deal if nothing else!

  • http://www.puritan.com/affiliate/Affiliate_about.asp Sal

    Jim thanks for the merchant. Puritan's Pride is listed there but I cannot find any record of Zibus in our affiliate program.

    I did some digging. The registrant of the domain is actually NuLife Financial who I cannot find in my program either. Looks like the domain has only just been registered.

    None the less, a program such as this would be a direct violation of our terms of service. Affiliates are not allowed to sell our products for a higher price than what we are advertising on our site.

    If anyone else has recovered any other information let me know. I found some other interesting info:

    http://www.504bank.com/OfferingPage.asp?OffNum=13…

    http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/ripoff163788….

  • brian

    I went to Zibus' web site and they asked for $19.95 for an application fee, and they said a representative would contact me in 5-7 working days. It has been much longer than that and still no word.This is a big scam with a huge misrepresentation because there is no mention of the $5,000 fee 99.9% of people would never give these goofballs one red cent if they new about that first. OR if they new Zibus would never even call you back. cROOKS

  • Brian

    I heard that Zibus is operated by 1 person and located Utah. I believe this is real scam business and recently one other new drop shipping site OOOOOX.com is operated, I believe it's same guy because address is near and business types same.All watch and away from this company.

  • http://www.backcountry.com Chuck Hamrick

    I just busted http://zibus.com/ which sold an unsuspecting victim a $5000 dropship program. It turns out that they recommended posting our products on Ebay and when the product was sold they were to order through their web login to http://zibus.com/ which ran the order through http://www.SimpleRebates.com/ or http://www.easyrefunds.com

    We provide free shipping for orders above $50 but they are advising to charge the Ebay customer shipping fees. Then they say they will rebate back the seller up to 20% which is double our commission so they are completely scamming.

    The order got busted by our fraud department when they inquired about the dropshipping schedule. Only we don't dropship. Furthermore, they include many of our top brands who don't dropship.

  • http://www.backcountry.com Chuck Hamrick

    I just busted zibus.com which sold an unsuspecting victim a $5000 dropship program. It turns out that they recommended posting our products on Ebay and when the product was sold they were to order through their web login which ran the order through http://www.SimpleRebates.com or http://www.easyrefunds.com

    We provide free shipping for orders above $50 but they are advising to charge the Ebay customer shipping fees. Then they say they will rebate back the seller up to 20% which is double our commission so they are completely scamming.

    The order got busted by our fraud department when they inquired about the dropshipping schedule. Only we don’t dropship. Furthermore, they include many of our top brands who don’t dropship.

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    AWESOME JOB.

    I hope all the merchants on the list will take the time to pursue this matter.

    I truly hope your company will prosecute to the fullest extent of the law. If all the company's lists would prosecute this type of business, it would set precedence and get the message out. No one tolerates fraud to there Brand, Copyright or Affiliate Programs.

    Kudos' Chuck!

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    Same guy new website

    Difference : 7-14K for access
    http://simplx.com/

    Same Merchants different website — Same Thief

  • dustin

    Hey everbody, please tell me if simplx is the same as zibus if it is please let me know

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    They are one in the same :(

    Hopefully you did not give them any money.

  • JOhnR

    Yes, they are the same scammers specializing in taking your money. I guess since they got so much bad publicity with zibus and people were seeing right through them they thought that by changing their name they may dupe more people.

  • Linda Ball

    As an authorized representative of Simplicity Group, LLC, I would like to assure you that Simplx is not a scam. Contrary to popular belief, Simplx is not Zibus, nor are we affiliated with Zibus in any way. Zibus, LLC, purchased a license to some of Simplicity's technology and our merchant network. However, that license agreement has been terminated due to Zibus' unethical business practices.

    We at Simplicity are aware of the postings in this forum, and would like to extend an invitation to all who would like to get the whole truth about our company to email me at info@Simplx.com. I will be happy to provide you with any information you would like.

    Many of the postings in this, and other, forums are based on inaccurate statements made by a disgruntled former employee. This has given our company a bad reputation, which is not deserved. Simplicity has worked for quite some time to build trusting relationships with our merchant network as well as our clients.

    I see that there is a large amount of confusion based on our price range. $7K-$14K is inaccurate. Our products start as low as $50. We don't post our price lists and product information on our website for the simple fact that our program packages are as varied as our applicants. Each product is tailored to the needs of each applicant, so it is impossible to give an accurate price listing. Our products include, but are not limited to, comprehensive training on how to drop ship by our Mentors, eCommerce Websites to allow our Brokers to sell from their own storefront, access to our merchant network and more.

    Again, I'd like to extend an invitation to all who would like to get the truth about Simplicity and Simplx.com to contact me at info@Simplx.com.

    Regards,

    Linda Ball
    Product Manager
    Simplx.com
    info@Simplx.com

  • http://wholesalers4u.tripod.com dropshippers

    I thought I was ripped off paying

  • Jeremy Mann

    Linda,

    there is no point in trying to make your company look any different. A scam is a scam and the more you have to work to try and convince us otherwise, the more we will believe that we are dealing with shady business practices. Maybe what you are doing is not illigal but it sure is not honest. I have seen other postings where people said they paid money to just get a very unprofessional phone call that asked for more money. And that's just plainly wrong.

    So if the ranges from $7 to 14K are wrong, list them here and on your website. List them UPFRONT right there where people pay your fee so they know exactly how much (or at least a range) they will need to invest. It seems to me, after reading the posts of your dissatisfied clients (kind of kills your 100% satisfaction policy, doesn't it?) that all you are doing is selling hot air trying to get rich and not giving anything of value in return. That is a scam in my book.

    With all your pleadings and postings, you are not convincing anybody. Simplx, zibus, whatever. It all stinks of fraud and BBB should know about it. Have a nice day.

  • Jim

    Boy am I glad I took the time to serch and find this page! I was about to inquire with Simplx as it looked good but I was skeptical when I didnt see any mention of their fees on their webpage…. RED FLAG!!!

    Thanks everyone for your insight. I will stay FAR AWAY. In the meantime, does any one have any advice on how to sell on ebay either with a dropshipper or wholesale? I am new at this but want to start up a viable business. Any help or advice you could offer would be well appreciated. Thanks again.

    Jim Cook

    jimcook006@cox.net

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    Hello Jim,

    Affiliate marketing or drop shipping, these business' are not for the week of heart nor for the person thinking your going to make it rich over night. Building a business online is just as difficult as building a Bricks & mortar business, most people have been taken by the hype and get rich quick schemes they stop reading when someone speaks about 12-16 hours of work a day.

    The days of building a normal website have long past, technologically advanced methodologies as well as database driven sites have some advantages, yet all this takes time to learn as well as reading what I call periodicals (newsletters, boards, blogs) just to stay on top of the thieves and changes taking place on the net.

    All the hype about eBay selling, its my opinion eBay has turned itself into a Drop shippers competition. eBay is raking in while individuals are selling the same stuff over and over again, fighting prices with each other. There is the late night promotional about making money on eBay, eBooks on how to make money from eBay. Its opinion when a methodology has spread to INFOMERCIAL its nothing but a way for the person pushing his methodology to make money. Might as well buy those sell real estate cd's. eBay has changed and its time for a new fish to grow — and another one will. So keep your eyes open.

  • carolynne

    Hi there,

    I am new to selling online. I am looking to buy wholesale merchandise for the online baby store I am going to launch. Your right it is a long process trying to find companies to buy from wholesale and then you have to buy in bulk etc. I am also looking to find companies where I can have my own merchandise made. But, I have no idea where to start. As far as drop shipping, I almost bought into simplx, thank god i did not. But i did sigh up with doba after checking register.com to see how long they have been around. Can anyone suggest how to go about drop shipping so I can start on Ebay, and my own online store. It is going to take time to get capitol to launch a full fledge store for this mother of two. =0)

    carolynne

  • http://www.datafeed-tutorial.com SandraR

    Carolynne,

    What most people for some unknown reason simply do not get is this is a BUSINESS

    –Write a business plan
    –Take a business course
    –Get your MBA if necessary (it helped me)
    –Look for some good seminars/workshops to attend
    –Hit the forums and boards for free information (if its free you get what you pay for)

    Basically learn how to start a business; the net is no different than any other business.

    Revenews is a great resource for BUSTING out the cheats and sharing the latest and greatest technology. I have not found any business plans here, there may be some but I have not found any.

    Hope this helps.