David Craig, on November 7th, 2014Recently I’ve been bombarded with ads inviting me to ‘FREE 2-hour seminars’ that will make me wealthy like this one�http://mruk-events.localspecific.com/�and this one�http://www.richdadedu.co.uk/
I’m sure that the seminars I provide links to above are absolutely fantabulous and hugely helpful to attendees. However, when I was researching my book PILLAGED How They’re Looting �413 Million a Day from your Savings and Pensions�I attended a few FREE ‘get rich’ seminars and my conclusion was that they were little short of being scams preying on the gullible and vulnerable.
I found that they all followed a very similar format. So, if you or anyone you know is planning to attend one of these FREE seminars, here’s roughly what should you expect:
1. Presenter is a liar�- the presenter will say that they used to work for a large company but, after they had attended a FREE seminar, they started making so much money from property/trading/forex or whatever that they didn’t need to work any more. They’ll probably show you a photo of the huge house they supposedly live in and claim they spend their time travelling on luxury holidays and enjoying their hobbies – golf, singing in amateur musicals or whatever. But if you Google them after the seminar, you’ll probably find their claim to be a wealthy expert is a lie. They might even be a failed actor who earns their crust by giving these seminars
2. Most attendees are losers – looking around the attendees, you’ll see that most of them are self-evident losers. There may be a high proportion of immigrants working in low-paid jobs who are particularly easy to sucker with a ‘get rich quick’ scheme
3. A little bit of knowledge – in the first 40 minutes of the seminar, you will get a bit of knowledge about property investing, share trading, foreign exchange or whatever and that’s quite fun and interesting
4. Do you have the courage? – the next 40 minutes of the seminar is a challenge to you. You’ll be asked if you want to spend the rest of your life stuck in your current job or do you dare to break free. You’ll probably be shown short videos of people who have supposedly become rich thanks to the seminar company. Having attended a few of these, I noticed that one supposedly satisfied customer was used in two different seminars. If I remember correctly, in one seminar he supposedly got rich from foreign exchange and in the other from property investment
5. The big sell – the last part of the seminar is aimed at getting you to sign up for a 2- or 3-day course. You’ll be told that this ‘normally costs �1,995 plus VAT’ but that if you sign up immediately you’ll get the course for ‘ONLY �995 plus VAT’. Some are even more expensive – �2,995 ‘but you’ll get it for ONLY �1,995’. Plus, if you sign up immediately, you’ll also get some CDs and a book ‘normally worth �1,997’ absolutely FREE! The presenter will then give you some dates for the courses but will warn that there are only a few places left on each date
6. Take the advanced course! – some of these FREE seminar companies make their money from the people attending the 2- to 3-day course. But others use the 2- to 3-day course to try to sell you into taking further courses – their ‘Advanced’ course costing thousands of pounds more – and paying for ‘your own individual mentor’ who will help you get rich
It seems that few of the people attending these FREE seminars ever ask themselves the question – if the presenters and mentors and their lackeys are so successful and rich, why are they wasting their time trying to persuade a bunch of losers like me to part with a thousand pounds or so?
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I realized many years ago when, following years working in the public sector, I became self-employed and therefore had entries in professional journals and Yellow Pages, that there are armies of rogues and sharks out there, all seeking to make money out of the earnings and gullibility of those who actually are doing something worthwhile. There were days when the phone seemed never to stop ringing with calls from slippery characters trying to persuade me to hand over my earnings to their pension schemes, investment plans, or insurance policies. I actually once went to a seminar – in other words a sales pitch – on financial investments and what a dubious crew of sharp-suited, smooth-tongued con men they were who were giving us the benefit of their superior knowledge! I downed a couple of glasses of equally dubious red plonk, while contemplating the astonishing proportion of punters who seemed actually to have been taken in by it all, and fled.
Its the same with training companies offering junk certificates in plumbing, tiling or for the very skilled IT jobs like MCSE certified / programmer. I looked into these over a decade ago when i was young & looking for a change of career.
They usually charge huge fees for very short courses that are not respected in the industry. The building skills courses are really just for DIYers and wannabe cowboys. The IT certificates are nothing compared to an official college cert / degree.
Luckly i didnt get involved but i met a few that did.