My review for One Week Marketing is long overdue.
I bought PotPieGirl’s article marketing action plan last year after seeing all the success stories it was creating.
I bought One Week Marketing more out of curiosity, to check out the action plan, since I was already having success using my own methods. I wasn’t really too excited about Squidoo either but I was hoping to learn something new also.
What is One Week Marketing About?
One Week Marketing addresses two issues that are relevant to any marketer no matter their experience especially newbies. Having an actual plan of action to get things done the right way and getting free traffic to your affiliate links.
One Week Marketing is a step by step action plan designed for getting traffic and building affiliate campaigns using free web properties. The guide particularly focuses on Squidoo but can be adapted to work with any other site that takes user submitted content.
All this info is laid out in a systematic way with a blow by blow case study, mind maps and the down to earth style of Jennifer Ledbetter who is better known in the internet marketing world as PotPieGirl.
One Week Marketing Contents
There are two packages available. I bought the basic package that contains:
- One Week Marketing Main Guide
- One Week Marketing Action Plan
- One Week Marketing Check List
- One Week Marketing Mind Maps
- A Conversation with Nick
There’s also a premium package that costs a bit more that contains whats in the basic package plus:
- 70 page Keyword Research Guide
- Squidoo 101 for Newbies which walks you though lens creation
- 50 page One Week Marketing Plan B which addresses a July 2009 Squidoo Policy change
- Expansion Guide
- How to Get 1000 Visitors in 30 Days or Less
- Guide to Using PotPieGirl’s Free Blogs
As you can see this is a lot of information. I know PotPieGirl from Wealthy Affiliate and she regularly contributes lots of helpful posts in the forum. She is very highly respected not only at Wealthy Affiliate but in the internet marketing community as well and is known for her winning personality.
That personality is exhibited throughout One Week Marketing and what you get is a simple but actionable marketing plan written as if a friend was guiding you through the entire process. Its a step by step plan that even an 8th grader could follow and implement. Its simple yet effective.
Does One Week Marketing Work?
By now you’ve probably realized where I’m going with this. Most guides that come out nowadays don’t even live up to their prelaunch hype. One Week Marketing is one of those rare gems that actually works.
The truth is One Week Marketing wasn’t anything new to me. I was using a similar method that worked for me so I knew that this system worked also. Plus, you can’t really ignore the fact that average people who are just getting into affiliate marketing are crediting their first sale or receiving their first check because they followed this system.
You might have also heard about the problems with Squidoo and their new policy of banning overworked topics that they consider too spammy for the site. This might make you wonder if the system still works.
It does. See the thing about One Week Marketing is that it isn’t just a plan for building lenses. You can use this action plan and substitute any other free site for Squidoo.
The big picture is that One Week Marketing doesn’t advocate building a business around free web properties. PotPieGirl clearly points out that in order to build a real business online, you need your own site. This is just an easy way to get started. A way to earn your first affiliate marketing commissions online and a way to take advantage of high PR sites like Squidoo to get great rankings in the search engines which translates to getting traffic.
What’s So Special About One Week Marketing?
Proof that the concept explored in One Week Marketing works can also be found within the package itself in a guide called A Conversation with Nick.
This guide alone is worth the price of the whole package as PotPieGirl walks a guy named Nick who is also a Wealthy Affiliate member, through the whole process from picking a niche to seeing results. Nick was the perfect ‘guinea pig’ for this case study because he had never made a sale before. The conversation takes place through a series of actual private messages which are documented word for word in the 169 page guide.
Nick tells his story in the video below.
Another good thing about One Week Marketing is that PotPieGirl is very supportive and you get updates as changes are made that may affect the effectiveness of her course.
Last time when Squidoo updated their policy and enforce stricter rules on what content they would allow on the site, people went crazy and their was even talk that One Week Marketing wouldn’t work.
All the customers of PotPieGirl were given a free download to the 50 page guide that addressed the Squidoo policy issue and were reassured that One Week Marketing still worked. And it did if you got the bigger picture.
Who is One Week Marketing For?
To really appreciate One Week Marketing, you’d have to be the person who it was really written for. The vast majority of people who want to see results are the ones who need this plan the most.
The system is geared more towards newbies or persons who are yet to make their first sale. So if you’re in that bracket then you’ll absolutely get a whole lot of value from One Week Marketing.
While I had my own system that I used successfully, I have to admit that I refined it using the One Week Marketing action plan. I think the reason why a lot of people lot One Week Marketing is that the methods are easy to implement and you can clearly see the results within a short period of time.
While I don’t really recommend much (because there’s a lot of garbage out there), One Week Marketing is a great course designed to force you into action and I’d recommend it to anyone who wants to get started earning online and also to anyone who wants to get more focused article marketing campaigns.
The Clickbank Code is a new product by a guy named Michael Jones. I’ve never heard of him prior to the Clickbank Code but it seems he is a very successful affiliate marketer and Clickbank product vendor.
The Clickbank Code focuses on making money with Clickbank (obviously) and Google Adwords. The first thing that went through my mind when I learned that is… how many ways can you make money with Clickbank and Adwords? Is this going to be anything new?
Clickbank Code Overview
Here’s an overview of the main Clickbank Code material:
Module #1 – Making a KILLING as an Affiliate
Video #1- Introduction
Video #2 – What is clickbank
Video #3- How to be Successful
Video #4- Marketing Terms
Video #5- Process Overview
Video #6- Pick Products
PDF file of Module #1
Clickbank-evaluator.xls
Module #2 – Powerful Keyword Research
Video #1 – Keywords Research
Video #2 – Important sorting & Filtering
PDF file of Module #2
Module #3 – It’s All About The Offer
Video #1- Setting up Your Offer
Video #2 – Your Domain
Video #3- Your Hosting Account
Video #4- Creating Your Landing Pages
Video #5- The Story
Video #6- Action Steps
PDF file of Module #3
Module #4 – Buyers on Demand
Video #1- Overview
Video #2 – Spot the Winners
Video #3- Scale it up
Video #4- Solution for Adwords Problems
PDF file of Module #4
Module #5 – Article What?
Video #1- Intro
Video #2 – What You Get
Video #3- The System
Video #4- Leverage & Tips
PDF file of Module #5
Module #6 – Killer FREE Traffic Tactic
Video #1- Overview
Video #2 – Comparison of PPC & SEO
Video #3- Expose The Power of Merging SEO & PPC
Video #4- Quickly Locate Forums in Your Niche
Video #5- Get Other People to Post
Video #6- Effective Forum Posting
PDF file of Module #6
Looks eerily like Commission Blueprint which is a great product that is far superior.
I think if you’re good at what you do and you’re making money then nothing is wrong with coming out with your own product to show how you do things whether its been done before or not. However, hyping it up as something “new” and promising to reveal “secrets” could lead to a very disappointing experience for customers if you can’t deliver.
This is exactly what I found out while researching The Clickbank Code.
The Clickbank Code Disappoints
Unfortunately for Mr Jones, almost all the reviews I read from people who have bought The Clickbank Code stated that they were “disappointed” and that was the exact word nearly all of them used.
Here’s an honest down to earth review of Clickbank Code by a user at the Warrior Forum.
I purchased it today.
Research – pick 5 or 6 products from clickbank and perform due diligence – market, keywords, traffic, demographics.
Adwords – start with $500 a day budget. Each keyword in own group. Send to landing page(s) on a mini site with enough unique content to avoid slap.
Tell a story to sell the product.
Track. Pick the winners. Expand to MSN and Yahoo.
Articles can be used for free traffic.
All been said before – and better (with examples and templates) – in products like commission blueprint and the like.
Comes in 4 modules – the clickbank code being the first and then 3 others for either 77 or 97 each.
Didn’t purchase the other three after watching the first 28 videos!
The 2 bonus products have very nice, professional graphics and sales pages. Could easily modify them for ones own product.
Summary – not enough detail for newbies – nothing new for experienced – and the middle ground will still not commit to putting a budget of $500 a day into Adwords (I would guess).
P.S. Am writing this as I could not find one single real review of this product from anyone who actually watched the videos and read the PDF’s.
Pretty much tells you all you need to know about The Clickbank Code.
The Bottom Line
- This product has been done before in more elaborate ways.
- Its not very newbie friendly – paying $500 per day on Adwords just to test usually means you already have a good understanding of how the process works and you’re making money. This doesn’t define the average newbie.
- The product simply doesn’t match the hype as there are no new techniques and no secret methods.
Keeping in mind that The Clickbank Code is based on how Michael Jones makes money as an affiliate marketer which isn’t much different to anyone else who knows what they’re doing. If you know the basics of affiliate marketing – research a niche, find a relevant product, get traffic etc – then you won’t need this product.
If on the other hand, you’re brand new and don’t even know what a niche is, Clickbank Code still may not be for you. Maybe you know the basics and just need a course in Adwords…get Beating Adwords (special offer through this link) instead.
I’d like to hear your comments about The Clickbank Code if you have any experience with it.
Came across this site today while doing some research. Its called GoogCash4U.com also knows as Internet Wealth Builder.
The thing that caught my attention at first was the name and I thought, “not another one of these Google money scams.” However this site seems to be different from all the other scammy sites as they try to at least make sure they’re not using deceptive advertising messages.
I, myself haven’t tried this product as its not available in my area so its left to be seen if people will complain about unauthorized charges to their credit card, difficulty in canceling their subscriptions and not receiving the product. Something tells me that they will but shame on them if they can’t make this work for people.
What You Should Know Before Ordering
It should be noted though before you do sign up for Goog Cash4U, how the payment subscription works, which is why I’m writing this post. Many people don’t read the terms before they sign up and get hit will unforeseen charges, then cry scam. The advertiser is partly to be blamed because they hide these terms in the fine print.
GoogCash4U doesn’t hide the terms…its right there when you’re ordering. Thing is, here is where it starts to sound strangely familiar to the other Google work from home scams.
To get their *free* kit, you need to send them $1.97 for shipping. This is for a 7 day evaluation period. After the 7 day period though, the site says that you will be charged $69.97 every month thereafter if you don’t cancel. Not too sure what the $67.97 is for at this point, unless they’re going to be sending you material every month or you’re going to be part of a membership site.
It doesn’t stop there. There’s also something called Alternative Funding which they say is a bonus. Bonuses are supposed to be complimentary and at no cost. However, your credit card is going to be subscribed to this as well when you sign up for GoogCash4U as I understand and after 14 days you get charged $29.95 per month which I’m sure is going to surprise the crap out of a lot of people who sign up expecting to only pay for the shipping of their kit.
This is known as ‘forced continuity’ and is used by companies with subscription based products such as supplements and magazines. If you don’t cancel your trial then you’re going to be billed which is why they give you the trial in the first place. They operate on the basis that if they offer something for free then more people will want it.
It works if the company is honest and provides an easy way for customers to cancel. The reason why the Google money scams have the reputation that they have is because they are dishonest from the very beginning.
Conclusion
I’m not sure if this is just another scam as I haven’t tried it but they do thrive to be honest in their presentation of the opportunity. However, the subscription model doesn’t look too great and this might be the cause of some future complaints.
Proceed with caution. This may or may not be a scam. I’ll try to find out more and make another post about my findings.
If anyone has any experience dealing with Goog Cash4U, good or bad, please share it with others in the comment section.
There’s a lot of buzz right now surrounding ‘HomeAtBiz’, a search term that seems to make no grammatical sense but at a glance you know it’s related to a home business opportunity.
Well, I checked it out and it leads to one of those fake newspaper articles advertising Easy Google Profit.
If you don’t already know, Easy Google Profit is a well known scam. It targets people who are looking for easy ways to make money online or a way to make an extra buck in today’s shaky economy.
These “Google business kit” scams are known by a lot of other names including Google Money System, Google Money Tree, Google Cash Kit and a host of others. They’re usually associated with fake blogs, fake newspaper articles and spam emails.
Why is HomeAtBiz /Easy Google Profit A Scam?
Everyone involved in the marketing of Easy Google Profit is practicing very unethical and shady marketing tactics with no regard for the people who will get taken.
Firstly, they say that Google is offering home jobs and that anyone can apply. This is false. Google doesn’t advertise jobs via third party sites in the form of vague home business opportunities.
Certainly if these newspaper articles were real they would link you to a page on the official Google website but this is not the case.Instead you get sent off to a site where they ask you to pay $1.99 for them to ship you the *free* informational kit.
Furthermore, there’s fine print at the bottom of the website that many people fail to read. The fine print states that Google has nothing to do with the opportunity being advertised. Hmmmm, what is going on there?
I’ve also seen reports of credit card information being stolen.
The Fake Article: How You Can Tell Something’s Wrong.
When you get forwarded to the fake newspaper article after typing in the HomeAtBiz search term, there are some clues on the page that will immediately tell you something fishy is going on. Sadly, many people won’t see these signs because they’re too caught up with the hope of making some easy money. Its always a good thing to have a healthy dose of skepticism when it comes to stuff like this.
Here are some ways you can tell something’s wrong with the article.
- The newspaper is from your town but you’ve never heard of it? In fact, the url in the address bar says something different from the name of the website.
- Nothing that is supposed to be clickable seems to work. For example, when it says “posted by Anthony“, you’re supposed to see a link to Anthony’s author profile and when it says “filed under Finance” then you’re supposed to see a link to all the other articles under the “Finance” category.
- All the clickable links on the page leads to the same site – the site where you sign up to give away your credit card information receive your free Google home business kit.
- How about that smiling lady with the child. Do you know her? She’s from your town and she’s supposed to be famous because there was some story on CNN, ABC and all those other channels about her. Don’t know Maria Summers? Well, there’s no Maria Summers because that’s not here name, the story was never on CNN or any of the other places they say it was featured and she’s not from your city because they’re using a script that identifies where you live from your ip address. And you will not see this but Maria Summers (that same woman) is also known by other names on hundreds of these same fake newspaper articles.
- Those ads seem to all lead to the same site. Well they’re not individual ads. If you notice its one huge banner that looks like different ads so it doesn’t matter which one you click on. Shady, shady, shady…
- The comment section? I can show you some other sites that these same comments are on. The comments are also closed due to spam. Well, if they left them open I’m sure they won’t be getting such favourable responses. They could at least moderate the comments. But the truth is that it’s all part of the act.
What To Do When You Come Across Scams like HomeAtBiz
The important thing to know is that Google doesn’t pay anyone to work from home. They do offer a program for website owners called Adsense which is the program these scammers are exploiting.
Google has addressed this issue once before and on their official blog they’ve also addressed it with a warning and suggestions on how to stay safe.
The three important ones:
- Before you fill out a form or give someone a credit card, do a web search to see what other people are saying about the company and its practices.
- Always read the fine print. Watch out for get-rich-quick schemes that charge a very low initial fee before sneaking in large reoccurring charges on your credit card or bank account.
- Be wary of companies that ask for upfront charges for services that Google actually offers for free. Check out our business solutions page before writing a check.
You can also report the sites to the Federal Trade Commission because they can do something about these false advertisers. Also use the share button share this post to all your friends so that they can be informed and stay safe.
Over the past year or so, I’ve been hearing about Maverick Money Makers and mostly hearing good things. So I did some digging around to see if I could find any dirt on this program.
Hopefully, if it was any good then I might find one or two bad reviews about it from people who signed up and didn’t give it a fair chance. This is common with nearly all programs.
I had to steer clear of the product whores who would promote anything good or bad for the love of money.
I found the reviews to be quite mixed – some found Maverick Money Makers to provide value and recommended it as “a great program for beginners” while some thought it was an outright rip off. I only chose reviews from actual members of the Maverick Money Makers program.
Personally, my main grouse with Maverick Money Makers is that its a membership site that costs a hefty $97/month. Not bad if you were getting half the stuff that’s available at Wealthy Affiliate for only $39/month. In any case, I think its heavily overpriced based on the reviews I found.
Here’s some:
Review 1 – NEGATIVE – From WhyDoWork forums
I was a member for about 5 months, and learned a lot of little tricks, but when I implemented them I have either gotten my account suspended, the methods didn’t work, some things on the sales page were missing on the inside.
His upsold CPA project is a naughty yet crafty way to fake a job offer for people who are looking for a job, fake an application process, then fake a rejection of the job, all so that you get the unsuspecting customers to put their name into an online conferencing/call center software to get paid $100 per lead.
My comments : I think this is unethical marketing and there’s more about this later on in this review.
The so-called “Mack Michaels” has apparently done something similar as a guy named Chris Lumb for former Incomegreed.com.
I’ll have to admit that Mack made his program look professional. He’s soft spoken. He’s got these videos that he personally guides you through and demos, but many of those methods are either outdated or downright don’t work. I’ve wasted a lot of time with them, but I pressed because I figured that I was doing something wrong, and I just had to keep pressing.
No, this one is a doozy. He is the ultimate conman, Twitter page and all, plus a customer service call center.
Some of the the techniques are useful such as learning how to domain forward with Go Daddy URL masking, but others just don’t work period. So technically, you the customer, are the Guinea Pig for his methods. You’re paying $97/month to be his experiment versus being the ultimate guru that he says he is and teaching you methods that have been working forever.
On the same thread:
Yes, Maverick Money Makers teaches some pretty shady tactics, including spamming forums.
Stay far, far away from this one indeed.
My comments: I found on the Warrior Forum a thread that supports the notion that Maverick Money Makers teaches spamming forums. I’m not sure why but maybe his instructions on how to do forum marketing aren’t clear and might have been misinterpreted by members.
Review 3 – NEGATIVE – Warrior Forum
I was a member for 3 months, and stayed a member only because of the claims made by mack for the new content coming soon, every time though, the content was not that special and is deffenitly not easy to make money with. Finally cancelled my reccuring payments, and will invest in alot better things with more value and less cost – MMM not reccomended by myself
And this on the same thread:
I have been a member of MMM for less than a month now and have to say that I have learned quite a bit. He is off on some things like the ebay video and calling Forex the stock market, but there is a lot of good information there.
Having said that; the main page shows proof of money made with MillNic – quite a lot of money – but there is nothing in the club about that company and making money with them. The last video says that he wont try to up sell you and that unlike others the club is all that you need. When you sign up you are up sold the VIP membership for $47 more a month and the Project CPA for 1/2 off if you are a VIP member.
I have been thinking about the Project CPA and they tell me “Project CPA is about various click per action campaigns.” This is very different from what you say above.
I have learned a lot from MMM and I [am] hoping to learn more about making money with companies like MillNic and Neverblue using PPC
Review 5 – NEGATIVE – Affilorama
i was a member for a while and honestly i think many of the things taught in the program were outdated. i rushed out to try to sell affiliate program with PPC and lost some money.. i wouldn’t recommend it.
And on the same thread:
I became a member but I didn’t really like some of the strategies taught from a moral point of view. I don’t know if he is still doing this. It was something to do with getting people to respond to an add for a fake job and then booking an online meeting room. I really didn’t like the idea of doing this. Just didn’t feel right to waste people’s time and raise their hopes.
Being Unethical Destroys A Good Thing
You have to be careful not only about the types of programs you choose to purchase online but how you market and treat the unsuspecting. Because lets face it, the majority of people that surf the internet probably don’t know what an affiliate link looks like and they most likely don’t know the tactics marketers use.
As mentioned in a couple of the above reviews, Mack Michaels teaches a method where he promotes a CPA product that pays $100 per lead. Good money that is. So come up with a smart strategy for promoting the product.
That product is Go To Meeting® and the “smart strategy” Michaels came up with was to get people to respond to a fake job. With the way the economy is, with all the layoffs and stuff, going this far is slimy enough.
Why go there? Oh yeah, the money.
It only gets worse for the unfortunate job applicant. Michaels would have him book an online meeting using Go To Meeting® – an online conference call software. At this point the job applicant is out some cash with no job in sight. The $100 commission is already credited.
This has caused Citrix Online – the makers of Go To Meeting® - to put a statement on their website saying that they’re not affiliated with Maverick Money Makers.
Part of the statement says:
Citrix Online is committed to the highest business and ethical standards and to giving our customers an excellent experience with our products. We have no affiliation whatsoever with Maverick Money Makers or any of their programs nor do we approve of their business practices.
When stuff like this is said about you, I won’t want to be affiliated with you either. I won’t recommend Maverick Money Makers just because of something like this.
Conclusion
From the reviews, I would say that Maverick Money Makers is not a scam and you may get some value out of it. The instructions may not be all that clear for a novice and not necessary for the advanced marketer.
I however think that teaching a method involving some shady practice involving Go To Meeting®, this is something to stay away from. I’d rather you learn how to make money online from ethical marketers, not someone who would put aside their values just to make a little (or a lot of) money.
I would recommend Wealthy Affiliate over Maverick Money Makers because:
* Wealthy Affiliate is more affordable at $39/month – MMM costs $97/month.
* Wealthy Affiliate is a more complete membership site with more tools, more resources and quality support. MMM doesn’t have a website builder or free webhosting.
If you’ve had any experience with Maverick Money Makers as a member, your comments are welcomed. Other comments and questions are also welcomed.
