Digital Marketing Scam: The Masterclass that makes you rich

Probably you have already seen such offers that make promises that seem to be too beautiful to be true. The question, how serious they are, can be answered easily :  many of these proposals are a rip off. When people realize they got cheated on, they cry and yell : the money is lost. Let’s be precise : the money is not lost, it just changed the owner. It went from you – the naive client – to the smart guy at the beach or in the Ferrari, who will spend it soon in a night club. If you want to learn how to avoid bad masterclass providers, then this article will be interesting for you.

What is a masterclass ?

The term masterclass was initially used in the area of classical music : A course or course series held by a maestro for advanced students.

As the word is very attractive, it became popular in general marketing too, to promote various types of training courses. Today, there is inflationary use of the term. But instead of real maestros with proven expertise know how, you often find various types of low quality providers : newbies, copycats and even frauds. Among the potential clients, advanced professionals generally know how to identify real experts, but naive people risk to become a victim.

A synonym for the term « masterclass » is « bootcamp », which comes from a military training context. Let’s now have a look at some popular scam methods.

Scam phrase 1 : Everybody can become a millionaire if he buys my bootcamp.

There is one sad truth in this phrase : many people don’t live at the true level of their capacities. The reasons are complex : insufficient education, lack of self-confidence, an inadequate professional network, health or family problems etc. As much as the assessment is true, that a lot of  people don’t exploit their full potential, as much it is true too, that a simple training course will not make them a millionaire only because the course is called a » masterclass ».

I could propose you the following masterclass : « Everybody can become a concert pianist. « When you open the first video course, you would get the details : at first you have to learn to play the piano for two years, than you make 8 years of intense training with 8 hours per day, and then you can play in the Carnegie Hall in New York.

Theoretically (!) everybody can become a virtuoso pianist. But the untold truth is : some people have no talent for music, but rather for sports. Some may have a certain musical talent, but maybe not for the piano, but for the guitar. And for the average piano learner it is much more realistic, that he will reach a level that allows him to play a few simple tunes in a family concert, than to play with a symphony orchestra. And for the very few that are among the top piano students, the road to Carnegie Hall will be very long, with a lot of hard work to do, and with plenty of concurrence during the whole journey.

Scam phrase 2: I reveal you my business secrets that make you rich.

All serious companies protect their business methods, which most often result from long and arduous work. Documents and procedures are kept confidential. Patents are registered to avoid being copied by others. There is intense competitor monitoring, in order to react with defense mechanisms if a concurrent comes in your sector.

Let’s use an example again: « John Brown Barbecue » is the best grill restaurant in town. 100 years ago grandma Olivia Brown invented the unique barbecue sauce that gives this special and inimitable flavour to the grill dishes. Nobody knows what’s in this awesome sauce …

Do you really think that the restaurant owner will reveal the barbecue sauce recipe from grandma Brown in a masterclass ? Maybe he’ll propose a course « How to make a good T-Bone-Steak », and another « How to make a fine Rib-Eye-Steak », but he’ll never reveal the sauce recipe invented by the late Olivia Brown in 1924. Never !

And now you have this guy in the Ferrari or at the beach who sells you a masterclass with his business secrets ? Why would he be so generous to reveal you all his success methods, instead of using them for himself to buy a second sports car? Does he have no problem with concurrents that might steal his future  clients ? Just think for one minute : is this a serious promise, or is it bullshit ?

Scam phrase 3: Check the positive evaluations and video testimonials.

Evaluations are fine, if they are verifiable, if there is a full and official name and company. If the evaluations are in the form of a small picture of « Tony «  and « Mary » with a banal flattering phrase, there is nothing serious about it. Sorry guys ! There are even low quality freelancer platforms where you can buy 50 « evaluations » for 5 EUR.

If there is a video evaluation, it’s already more interesting, but here again you should clarify the following questions : Can you verify the identity of the person and the veracity of his infos ? If the video attestor is completely anonymous, without a serious Linkedin profile or a serious website, then you cannot be sure that the evaluation is authentic.

Scam phrase 4 : You get a refund if you are not satisfied

This phrase sounds good at first glance. The problem is : The guy on the beach who sells the Masterclass has no official homepage, but just a one shot landing page that he deletes one week later. You will not be able to access the general terms and conditions anymore. Or there were no general terms and conditions at all, already when you did the purchase. Or the beach guy has a company registered in a postal box in Mauritius, and you do not know a lawyer there who could help you get your 10 k EUR back, etc.

If you want to avoid risks with dubious training providers, better propose to pay them after the training, when the promises have come true.

Scam phrase 5 : Order your free video/ free Ebook etc 

This is an old marketing method to get your contact data. You exchange your email address (plus potentially some closer infos about you) against some form of content. By giving your contact details you subscribe to a newsletter. So far everything is fine with this method.

But : You should be aware that you will never get infos that are worth thousands of EUR. It’s like in the supermarket with a product promo :  you get a minishot of Whiskey to taste a new brand, but you don’t get a full cocktail.

With a serious provider who has a serious website, you will get some useful and helpful infos for free. And then you’ll get a newsletter from time to time that proposes you to purchase his regular services. You will be able to unsubscribe from the newsletter at any moment. 

With an unserious provider – very often the beach or sports car guy who has the alleged secret to become a millionaire – you will get useless infos, and then your email box will be spammed with expensive commercial offers. The beach guy wants your money, the sports car guy wants your money too. Both will send you spam messages 3 times per day. Some of these guys don’t even allow you to unsubscribe from their spam emails, so that you have to block them.

Special Case : Financing by an official organism

A particular case are bad « masterclasses » that are financed or co-financed by official organisms, like the job center or by some sort of professional training credits. In France, the professional training sector for initial and continuous trainings represents a market of 26 billion EUR (for the year 2017, without the direct expenses of companies). 

There are some weird training providers among these officially sponsored programs.

In case of this type of financing you don’t directly lose money (or not the full amount, if there is a mixed financing between you and the organism), but you miss the opportunity to get a better training course for the respective amount.

Serious Trainings do exist

Despite the numerous scammers, there are serious offers and providers too. The stake is to identify what’s right and what’s wrong.

There are training courses that do not teach new scientific discoveries, but stuff you could learn by books, blog articles and Youtube videos too. Example : You want to build a homepage on your own. You could either invest 6 months of intense research and grab all necessary infos in books, videos and articles. Or you purchase a really good masterclass that allows you to build the site in one month. This type of a masterclass is not a scam, because it gives you concrete and actionable infos, with a real and concrete value : you save precious time and energy that you can better spend on your core business.  

A 4-week-bootcamp that promises you to become an « Expert for Software Development » is not serious. But if the course is called « Introduction to software development », then it makes sense. And if the target public for the course are already experienced software developpers, than you can propose them a specialized course to become for example an expert for a specific programming language.

The value of a training course (or masterclass or bootcamp) must be analyzed with regard to these points : the quality of the informations, a realistic goal, the concrete event mode (presence or video class), and the concrete profile of the instructor (his education, experience and charisma).

Video Masterclass versus Presence Masterclass

You probably know that there is a difference between music from the radio and a live concert. With training courses it’s the same.

Video Courses are absolutely legitimate – as long as they are realized by real experts who have good pedagogic skills.

I did my whole bachelor degree in digital marketing with an online business school. Therefore I perfectly know the pros and cons of distance learning. I am happy with my bachelor earned by video classes. But the real fun was my master in international business with presence classes: having interesting teachers in front of you, being able to ask questions at any moment, making presentations and group work, having a drink with colleagues in the evening etc.

A presence class will always be of a higher quality than a video class. And a live video class – that allows at least some interaction between the teacher and the participants – is of a higher quality than a pre-registered video class. Keep this quality hierarchy in mind when choosing a masterclass provider. The price of a masterclass should be proportional to this hierarchy too.

The personality aspect of the training provider

Did you ever have a boring teacher in school ? Was it in history or in mathematics ? If it was in mathematics : How different could your life be, had you had a charismatic teacher ? Well, the good point is : you did not pay yourself for your boring teacher – if you were in a public school. And if you were in a private school and your parents paid for a boring teacher : shit happens !

But why should you now spend a lot of your own money for a boring masterclass ? Do always carefully check the quality of the guy who does the masterclass : his education, experience and charisma. Everything depends on the content of the workshop too : If you buy a course to improve your Excel skills, than the charisma level of the lecturer is probably less important than if you buy a training for Key Account Sales.

How much would I pay for a bootcamp to become a millionaire ?

I don’t believe at all in masterclasses that « teach » you how to become a millionaire by working from the beach. Neither do I believe in masterclasses that « teach » you how to become an expert in just 4 weeks for this or that discipline. If you want to become an expert for whatsoever, then make a professional training with an official degree, or go to university or to a business school. There are some rare cases of people who become experts without a formal training, but they have to work very hard to reach this level, they never get it in 4 weeks in a » bootcamp ».  

I personally would pay more than 1000 EUR for a masterclass, if the offer is reasonable as described before : a high quality of the training content, a realistic goal, a reasonable value for money ratio concerning the concrete event mode (presence or video class), and a good quality of the teacher (in terms of education, experience and charisma).

For some very charismatic people I would even pay 10 k EUR for a masterclass, because they are really inspiring personalities. Meeting them in real (not by a pre-registered video) would be a great experience for me that I consider worth the money. If you want to know who these extraordinary persons are, than follow me on Linkedin and X, I might reveal this info one day.

Are you still unsure if the masterclass you spotted is serious or not ? – Reserve a coaching call to avoid being ripped off !   

As a marketing expert I am trained in sales psychology. During my observation of the international coaching and masterclass milieu I came across dozens of unserious providers. Good common sense does basically allow to everybody not to fall in such traps, but nevertheless many people are tempted to send thousands of EUR (or GBP or USD) to providers that have a landing page with a beach or sports car picture.

In order to help unexperienced or hesitating consumers, I propose a live coaching call to analyze the seriousness of the masterclass provider. I examine the critical points and potential red flags that allow you to make an informed decision yourself.

If you are willing to spend 1000 EUR or more for a strange masterclass, and you are afraid of losing your money at the same time, then you should have a call with me. (The fee for this 60 minutes call is 150 EUR.) 

If the coaching call allows you to understand that the provider makes a serious offer, then the coaching fee does not make a big difference for you at the end of the day.

And if the coaching call helps you to identify the provider as unserious, then you save 850 EUR or more ! Congratulations !

What you should do next:

Reserve your Coaching Call Here (1 Hour Coaching, Fee = 150 EUR)

Per Call one provider for a training course/ masterclass/ bootcamp will be analyzed.

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