Episode 907 – Seminar Scams Part Two
[00:00:08] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey everybody! It's Tom here with episode 907 of Screw the Commute podcast. We're going to talk about Seminar Scams part two today. So, I want to make sure you don't get ripped off at seminars. And this is part of our Keep You Safe series. 906 was Seminar Scams. Part one 905 was phishing emails. How to keep from getting zapped with those 904 was catfishing. That's something that has to do with romance or extortion or little, you know, young people or or committing suicide over this. How important this is. 903 is QR code scams. Anytime you want to get to a bank episode, you go to screwthecommute.com, slash, and then the episode number 903 QR code scams 904. Catfishing 905. Phishing 906. Seminar scams part one. This is Seminar Scams, part two. And there'll be a part three on the seminar scams. All right, let's get into them. Oh, and, uh, wait a minute. I want to make sure you grab a copy of our automation e-book at screwthecommute.com/automatefree. Check out my mentor program at GreatInternetMarketingTraining.com.

[00:01:35] All right, next thing is like the 11th one that I'm telling you about of seminar scams. Testimonials. I've seen people teach others to trade testimonials, even with no idea of the other person's product or anything. This is totally fraudulent. Federal Trade Commission is has really come out, uh, you know, in the last couple years against, uh, testimonials.

[00:02:04] I encourage you to look up FTC rulings on testimonials, and it'll really open your eyes on what you could and can't do. And I've called up some people where I see testimonials and they said, oh, we just did it to get a link back to our website. You know, I don't even know what the product is, you know? So, I mean, imagine the type of person that would admit that, I mean, these people don't care about anything. That's one of the reasons I started my school was because people have no integrity anymore. All right. Testimonials. All right. Next thing is networking promises. So they they pretend to be a big shot. And they got all these big shot friends and celebrity friends and industry friends, and they're the big shot of the big shots. And they promise to, to, um, network you into that that bunch of people. Well, it never happens or they they're in front of an industry person and they say, this is Joe. And then they claim they introduced you and that's it. So all these big networking claims, anybody that's worth anything is not going to introduce an unknown person just because they're their student. And, you know, possibly ruin their connection with their big shot friends. Yeah, unless the big shot friends are in on it, and then they get some money from talking to you and pretending, you know, to make a deal with you, and then it never happens.

[00:03:34] That kind of crap. So networking promises. You got to be very skeptical of those. All right. Next thing is refund policies. Oh my God, these scumbags. These scumbags. This one guy I know, his assistant said, hey, I'm trying to check the 800 number. And the guy said, for what? She said, well, I want to see if there's any refund requests or people need any help, he says. Crazy. I never check that. He didn't even know what the password was to get into the the the voicemail. He said, no, we want to make sure that it goes past the refund period before anybody can ever get in touch with us. I mean, that's what he told his assistant, who told it to me, the scumbag. Again, as I told you in the last episode, make very specific notes at the time when things are claimed and record them if you can, without getting in trouble. Let's see what else on refund policies. Um. Oh. Another scumbag. Uh, well, some of the same scumbags do the same things. They make sure the, uh, that let's say you buy something at a seminar and they're going to ship it to you later. Well, they don't ship it till after the refund period is over.

[00:04:50] I mean, it's just I mean, these are simple scams, all right? But they do them all the time. You know, the data purchase was at the date of the seminar, and then 30 days or five weeks later, you get it in the mail, even if you've been calling their 800 number, which they don't answer. And, you know, so one thing you should always do is pay with credit card, because the credit card companies will stick up for you. And a lot of these things, uh, even, uh, even if the written thing that you signed, you know, is, is really against public policy. A lot of times the credit card companies will stick up for you. But but you don't write a check and don't give cash. Write credit cards. Is is your best chance. All right. Refund policies. All right. Next sale is presale contact. And there's two different ways this happens. One is they make themselves look so aloof and so important and and they blow in and blow out, uh, you know, because they're so important compared to you. And you buy their stuff, but you really don't know what you're getting at that point. So that's one method. Another method is they're all over you before you buy they. Right. They're they're very accessible. They talk to you and they tell you how great your ideas are, which we're going to get to later.

[00:06:14] And and then once they get your money is when they disappear. All right. So you got to pay attention to the pre-sale contact and the sincerity of it, uh, and ask around. I mean, you should always ask other people that aren't shills, which I mentioned, I think on the last episode, uh, that pretend they don't know the person, but how great they are, you know? So you got to really be careful at these, at these seminars because you get into the group think thing and everybody you don't know, you really don't know if ten people are saying how great something is, if they're all shills, you just don't know. And some of these seminars take home $1 million or $5 million or $10 million. All right. So so they're not above paying shills and paying, you know, B-list celebrities to show up and stuff like that. Okay. Next thing is fake access. Now, one of my favorite, I think I'm going to give this to Double Talk Hall of Fame is this girl I know that's thinks she's out of Canada. And the one of the biggest bullshitters on the face of the earth. I, I heard her say this and I did a double take. I'm like, none of it makes a bit of sense, but it sounds great. And here's what she said. She said, you get unlimited. I'm going to break this down for you too.

[00:07:41] You get unlimited one on one time with me via teleseminar. All right. It sounds like if you just took it on face value. Oh, man. We get unlimited one on one time with her. No, you don't get any one on one time with her. I'm probably the only person on earth at my level that actually gives one on one time. All right, because I grew up in a small town and we did what we say we're going to do. But anyway, the reason she's such a bullshitter is that, first of all, unlimited. The word unlimited makes you think like, you can talk to her all you want, right? One on one. Well, when you when you go to the end of her sentence there via teleseminar. Well, teleseminars are only held when she decides to have one. It's not all day, every day. It's once in a while or whenever. Maybe she does once a week, I don't know, so that doesn't make sense at all. Yeah, it's not unlimited one on one time because she only has teleseminars. All right. Now the one on one part is bullshit because teleseminars are groups of people. Uh, this is not a zoom one on one call like I do with my students. This is a teleseminar. Or it would be a zoom, a big zoom group call.

[00:09:17] So it's not one on one then either. So the whole sentence was total bullshit. She just spewed it out of her pretty face. All right. And so you got to be highly in tune with what is said. And that's why having a recording of it is good and writing it down is good. Like I said, the recording though, like I said, I don't want you to get in trouble by recording things that can get you in trouble. Okay, so that's fake access. Uh, next one, I'm going to read this to you. I just made this up. Super titanium. Platinum. Gold. Silver diamond. Emerald packages. I sit back and I'm an audience watcher, and I see these, um, these fake seminar leaders. I guess they're technically our seminar leaders since they're up there, but. But, uh, the silver package, you get this and platinum, you get this and go. And I see the audience looking at each other like, what? What? What the heck? And I kind of laugh at that because I know if I'm there, I'm taking the money home. I got one deal. Take it or leave it, and it's clear exactly what you're going to get. And I never renege. So nobody ever, um, you know, says, oh, he's bullshitting. Uh, so it's it's they just try to make it sound so good, and it's designed so you really don't know what you're getting.

[00:10:43] You know, they get you in the group mentality and the the mob think and the rush to the back of the room, which I don't do that either. And uh, and it's all BS. It's all BS designed to confuse you and get your money. Okay. Next one is emergency calls. They'll they'll put this big thing as you have an emergency call. I'll give you my cell phone number. Everything. Well, these scumbags, one guy, it was two weeks before he returned an emergency call. I'd say that emergency might have passed by that time, right. Or gotten so worse that it crushed the person. Emergency calls should be something which you return within 24 hours. And then I got complaints about this other guy that the emergency call that he needed desperate help from his coach, that he paid a lot of money to. And the whole call, the coach was trying to ask him for advice because he was an expert on some topic. And I talked about theft of from conversion, theft of conversion on the last episode where that coach probably took all those ideas, made money on it on his own right, and screwed over the the person that paid him to be a coach. So so emergency calls, make sure you get the exact details of it and consequences if they're not returned. Uh, next thing is, your ideas are great. This is where they puff you up.

[00:12:14] They puff you up no matter what kind of horseshit idea you come up with, they they tell you how great it is and the great potential of it. This is, of course, all before they get your money. Then as soon as they get your money, things start going downhill. Your horseshit idea is now being shoveled back in your face because they start claiming you that the reason it's not working is because you didn't do this and you didn't follow this advice and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And see, so they're blaming you for the failure when the idea was dog shit in the first place. All right. So they your ideas are great is one of the scams. All right. Next thing is fake credentials. I've seen this one guy make up a fake award. Have some one of his neighbor, uh, pretend to be the in charge of the award. Give himself the award. Claim that a bunch of other people, big names you might have heard of, had gotten the award previously when it never even existed, and then canceled the whole thing, you know, but claimed he's an award winning so and so. Right. So that's one another two big name people that you absolutely have heard of. Their names were worldwide sensation based on books and they'd written and stuff like that. Fake diplomas, fake PhDs from diploma mills out of California.

[00:13:40] All right, so just fake credentials, and then some of them just lie about it. They just make up. Hey, I did this, I did this, I'm a certified this, that and the other, and they just lie. So you got to really check out the credentials and where they're from. And, uh, and the legitimacy of the awards. I know this one lady I know, and she's so sweet but so gullible. They this lawyer makes up this fake award thing that, uh, and makes and throws a big black tie event for it. It's just totally fake. And you have to pay to apply to it. And I mean, all this bullshit. So fake credentials. Next is fake masterminds. A mastermind is a is a relatively small group of people of similar ilk and level in life and business. Uh, working on stuff now, they don't have to be exactly the same. That wouldn't be great, but close in experience level and they help each other and so forth. So these, these piece of shit seminar leaders throw these gigantic masterminds 100 or more people where. Yeah. And then they have these hot seats where you get, you know, a few minutes to everybody helping you. And they're designed to mask the fact that the seminar leader is an idiot, other than a good con man or con woman, because they don't have to come up with any great input.

[00:15:08] It's all coming from the crowd, and the only people that that ever probably gain a little bit from these or beginners, because all these experienced people are throwing in all the help and there's nobody helping them. So they put their money in large amounts of money to be in this mastermind. That's fake. It's an idiot con person. Mastermind leader that's just grabbing money and is probably a good copywriter, making you think this is very valuable to you. So fake masterminds. All right, so we got one more session with this that's got some bonus and new scams and Christian stuff. And I mean, it's really sad, a lot of it, But, what's not sad is if you pay attention to these three episodes, you're not going to get scammed at a seminar. If you do, it's your own fault because you didn't pay attention to these things. So. So that's my story and I'm sticking to it. This is episode 907, and 908 will be a bunch of bonus scams and then so forth. So this whole series started at 905. No, wait a minute, 903 with QR code scams and and and took off until the next episode. So so there you go. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Check out my mentor program. GreatinternetmarketingTraining.com and I will see you on the next episode.