Serving the Direct Selling and Network Marketing Executive Since 2004 Volume 12, Issue 11• November 2016

SPECIAL REPRINT EDITION

©2016 Direct Selling News. All Rights Reserved. Material may not be reproduced in whole or in part in any form without written permission | www.directsellingnews.com

4LIFE RESEARCH:THE SCIENCE BEHIND DISTRIBUTOR SUCCESSby J.M. Emmert

When David and Bianca Lisonbee founded 4Life Research in 1998, they believed the differentiating

factor for their company would be an ongoing commitment to research—research not only to develop high-quality products that would enable customers to transform their lives, but, just as important, research that would empower distributors with credibility in a competitive marketplace.

That commitment has been the reason for the ongoing success of the Sandy, Utah-based company, which now has hundreds of thousands of distributors and customers with offices in 25 countries across five continents. Today, led by President and CEO Steve Tew, 4Life Research is a global leader in protein sciences.

FEATURES

COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

A Message of Science“Among our unique value propositions is the investment 4Life makes

in research and development, quality control protocols, and every step of the manufacturing process,” says Dr. David Vollmer, Ph.D., who is 4Life’s Chief Scientific Officer. “Our science is a differentiating factor in the marketplace.”

Vollmer chairs 4Life’s Health Sciences Advisory Board, an independent council of doctors, scientists and researchers across the United States who work to inform 4Life’s in-house R&D team of the latest and most innovative work being done in the area of protein sciences.

4Life’s newest product is 4LifeTransform Burn™, a patent-pending and proprietary thermogenic blend that supports an accelerated approach to body transformation that was introduced at the company’s annual convention in October.

Burn’s hoped-for effects were substantiated through 4Life’s research in thermogenesis, the biological process in which the body breaks down fat and generates heat. “For the first time ever, we’ve used thermogenesis to show how 4LifeTransform Burn ignites the fat-burning process in the body,” says Vollmer.

4Life’s thermogenic research included an independent, preclinical laboratory study conducted at The Jackson Laboratory, a genetic testing laboratory, and an in-house 12-week pilot study. Vollmer and his team used a process called thermal imaging, the same technology used by the military to track the movement of people in the dark. In this study it was used to measure thermogenesis in the body, which shows how healthy a person is and how efficiently the body burns fat.

Supportive Pilot Studies In addition to the thermogenic research, 4Life conducted two in-

house pilot studies on the Burn product during the 18 months leading up to the product release, collecting over a million points of data. Vollmer and his staff found several compelling data points to support the product’s ability to burn fat.

The first was that Burn was shown to accelerate metabolism and double a body’s ability to burn fat. The second was that it triggered body fat loss without altering lean muscle. “That’s a really important point because what you find a lot of times when you have these weight loss or weight management programs is you will see weight loss but a lot of that weight loss will be lean mass,” explains Vollmer.

Burn also decreased hunger cravings and increased feelings of fullness. “One of the things that we often see when we do these types of studies is that as you’re starting to lose weight you have these issues with hunger,” says Vollmer. “If you go on these caloric-restrictive diets, people complain that they’re always hungry. So we wanted to make sure as we were going through this process that we would mitigate that issue as much as we could. What we found, statistically, is the hunger cravings decreased over time and feelings of fullness increased. That’s important because we don’t want to create this product where you’re always hungry because that is a common complaint in weight-loss programs.” A fourth data point showed that Burn, when combined with 4Life PRO-TF®, increased the molecular fat-burning marker, UCP1, by more than 50 percent.

Creating the Brand ExperienceThe hope is that Burn and the thermogenic research behind it will

reach the level of success of the company’s previous offering, 4Life PRO-TF®. The April 2015 launch of PRO-TF, a protein infusion that supports weight management, muscle performance and the immune system, was the company’s most successful product introduction to date, not only for the $18 million in worldwide sales to date, but also for accolades received for its marketing.

“We’re as passionate about marketing as our scientists are about substantiation because both are tools that distributors use to share our products with new customers,” says Kelly Bellerose, 4Life’s Vice President of Product Marketing.

For the PRO-TF campaign, 4Life combined athletic endorsements, customer trials and testimonials, a research partnership with Auburn University, and a series of marketing collateral that included digital product profile sheets, the website 4LifeTransform.com and a 4LifeTransform app. The app and website were designed to support

2 ©2016 Direct Selling News. All Rights Reserved. Material may not be reproduced in whole or in part in any form without written permission | www.directsellingnews.com

0

Poor diet alone

4LifeTransform Burn™ combined with PRO-TF® increased the molecular fat burning marker, UCP1, by more than 50%.^*

UCP1

FAT

BUR

NING

MAR

KER

INCREASED MOLECULAR FAT BURNING MARKER 50%*

120

140

160

180

100

80

60

40

20

Poor diet plus 4LifeTransform Burn™ and PRO-TF®Poor diet plus 4LifeTransform Burn™

100%106%

155%

Over a 12-week period, 4LifeTransform Burn™ acceleratedmetabolism and doubled the body’s ability to burn fat.*

ACCELERATED METABOLISM*

Week 0: 36 Week 12: 72

Burn, when combined with 4LifeTransform PRO-TF®, increased the molecular fat-burning marker, UCP1, by more than 50 percent.

FEATURES

COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

©2016 Direct Selling News. All Rights Reserved. Material may not be reproduced in whole or in part in any form without written permission | www.directsellingnews.com 3

the field with their customer acquisition and retention efforts. The app, which has had over 32,000 downloads since it was introduced, allows users to build groups and access information about working out, healthy dieting, and the need for water and sleep. The website, which has had over 265,000 views from 165 countries, includes customer success stories and testimonials from renowned athletes—such as 2016 USA OPEN National Bench Press Champion Brady Stewart and Mixed Martial Arts fighter Pearl Gonzalez—who use the product as part of their training regimens.

“We wanted to empower distributors with a multiplicity of tools on many platforms, both digital and hard copy, and then the voices: academic, athletic and personal experience from customers,” says Bellerose.

The marketing efforts by 4Life have not gone unnoticed. In June, the company was presented with the Direct Selling Association’s award for excellence in Marketing & Sales Campaigns for the launch of PRO-TF® and the 4LifeTranform® brand. This award came just a month after American Business Awards honored the company with two Stevie Awards—Campaign of the Year and Lifestyle Award for its app. Finally, 4Life was one of five finalists for the recent 2016 SupplySide CPG Editor’s Choice Awards in the sports nutrition category for achievement in innovation and market impact.

An Emphasis on Innovation and Validation4Life’s commitment to progressive science does not stop with research

and development. The company also has invested in patent acquisition and manufacturing. The company now holds four U.S. patents and

32 international patents, with dozens more pending. In December 2014, it broke ground on a 46,000-square-foot plant in Vineyard, Utah, just 20 minutes from its corporate headquarters in Sandy. A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held in December 2015, and the plant

became fully operational in the first quarter of 2016.

The Vineyard facility gives 4Life start-to-finish control over every step of the manufacturing process, including sourcing of raw materials, warehousing, batching, blending, encapsulating and packaging of the majority of the top-selling 4Life Transfer Factor® products. It is currently generating 500,000 bottles, which equates to 40 million capsules, per month.

“The manufacturing facility allows us to validate our processes to ensure superior blending, encapsulation and packaging,” says Vollmer. “One of the first things we did was undertake a validation campaign that was essentially pulled out of the same type of validations done in pharmaceutical companies and applied that to the processes in the new facility.”

The company believes the new facility, which currently employs 50 production and warehousing workers, will guarantee the delivery of quality products for years to come.

“2016 has been a stellar year for our products and the 4LifeTransform® brand,” says Chief Operating Officer Danny Lee. “Burn will, I think, give us the momentum we need to make 2017 another record-breaking year.” DSN

4Life Research’s use of thermal imaging for its research on the effects of 4LifeTransform Burn™ on brown adipose tissue is the first of its kind not only in direct selling but in any industry.

4Life founders David and Bianca Lisonbee with President and CEO Steve Tew.

The Direct Selling Association’s award for excellence in Marketing & Sales Campaigns, presented to 4Life for the launch of PRO-TF® and the 4Life Transform® brand.

ACCELERATE YOUR BODY TRANSFORMATION!

With the 4LifeTransform® 30-Day Accelerator System for men or women

This easy-to-follow system features proprietary products with scientifically proven ingredients to help you achieve real and lasting body transformation.*

4LIFETRANSFORM 30-DAY ACCELERATOR SYSTEM FOR MEN PRE-ORDER ITEM #999451, CUST/DISTR: $225.95 (165 LP)

*THESE STATEMENTS HAVE NOT BEEN EVALUATED BY THE FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION. THESE PRODUCTS ARE NOT INTENDED TO DIAGNOSE, TREAT, CURE, OR PREVENT ANY DISEASE.

ORDER AND START YOUR TRANSFORMATION TODAY!

Available for pre-order beginning October 18 (will ship after December 9) and goes on sale December 15.

4LIFETRANSFORM 30-DAY ACCELERATOR SYSTEM FOR WOMEN PRE-ORDER ITEM #999452, CUST/DISTR: $225.95 (165 LP)

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