Matt Slick has a page entitled Cults! An outline analysis. Interestingly, Jesus and the early New Testament Church would fall under the label of "cultist":
New Teaching - has a new theology and doctrine. Jesus being the divine Messiah was something that converts had to accept (e.g., the Bereans in Acts 17:11) as well as the termination of circumcision being a requirement for entry into the New Covenant (see the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15).
Only True Teaching - often considers traditional religious systems to be apostate and it alone possesses the complete truth. Jesus declared himself to be the sole source of salvation in John 14:6 and 17:5.
Strong Leadership - often an individual or small but powerful leadership group holds control of the group’s teachings and practices. Jesus was viewed as the pre-existing, divine, Son of God. Peter was promised the keys to the kingdom of heaven (Matt 16:18-19).
Asset Acquirement - often requires tithing and/or property transfer to the religious system. See Acts 5 where Ananias was struck dead for not giving the proceeds from a sale of property to the apostles (v. 5). Further proof of the "cult" nature of the NT Church was that Peter called Ananias and Sapphira, his wife, as being possessed by Satan (v. 3).
Apocalyptic - to give the members a future focus and philosophical purpose in avoiding the apocalypse or being delivered through it. Jesus spoke much of His Second Coming (see the Olivet Discourse recorded in Matt 24; Mark 13; Luke 21), and the apostle Paul spoke much of the Second Coming (e.g., 1 Cor 15:22-28; 1 Thess 4:16). Further, the book of Revelation is permeated with Apocalyptic concepts.
One could go on until the cows come home, but it should be seen that the various evidences of a group being a "cult" and the members thereof as "cultists" are flawed as they would force one, if they were to be consistent, to reject Jesus and His followers as recorded in the New Testament as "cultists."
For further reading:
Jeff Lindsay, Do Latter-day Saints Belong to "The Mormon Cult"? (Cult Definitions, the Trinity, the Bible, Jesus Christ, and Other Issues)
Daniel C. Peterson and Stephen D. Ricks, Mormonism as "Cult": The Limits of Lexical Polemics (from the 1992 book, Offenders for a Word: How Anti-Mormons Play Word Games with the Latter-day Saints)
