A compensation plan is not a single entity. It consists of numerous rules and compensation elements. In broad brush strokes, we have status, structure, rank, and commission. These all work together to drive behaviour. In the post, I want to focus on network members' status.  

To ensure that your members remain active in the network and are not simply commission collectors, it is standard practice to set some minimum activity levels and assign a status when the requirements are met. For example, you could have Superstar, Active, Non-Active, Stagnant, Suspended and Blacklisted.  A Superstar could be a person who achieves in excess of $2000 sales per month; Active could be between $200 to $1999 per month; Non-Active could be between $0 and $199; Stagnant could be $0 for a period of, say, 3 months; and Black Listed could be a manual setting.

These statuses allow you to provide levels of reward and take specific actions. A Superstar could get special discounts, recognition or be able to access products and information not available to any other status. Active status and above could determine whether commissions accrue to the member. Non-Active status could prevent the commission from being accrued. Stagnant status could result in a member being demoted to a customer, and Black Listing a member could deny access to the system in total.

So, your compensation rule could state that to be promoted or earn commission, a member must be active and must also have x number of personally recruited active recruits of a specific rank. You could take this a step further and require x number of active members in x number of levels deep.