For the entire month of February, I decided to put an advert in the Business Opportunity section of Exchange and Mart.

Basically, this was a rather expensive test to see the kind of response an ad would generate.

It was a very simple experiment:

I paid for one 5x5cm “Photo Spot” for 4 weeks at £45 + VAT per week.

Total spend = £211

I set everything up with a new tracking domain so that I could be sure that any hits I got to my site were coming directly from that advert and that advert only.

Net gain for me per sale would be around £22 so I needed to sell about 10 to break even.

The advert started on the 1st February.

Results:

OK, first week I got 51 hits – and at this point I knew this wouldn’t be a success.

2nd week I got 58 hits, 3rd week 54 and in the 4th week I got 80 hits.

Total hits = 243

Which worked out at about 87p per visitor – not cheap considering that this type of advertising is not very targetted.

After all that, I didn’t get a single sale so it wasn’t a success and I pulled the plug.

The rep at Exchange and Mart called to ask if I wanted to extend the advert – I said a definite NO!

He then tried to cross-sell me into a smaller, less expensive advert but I pointed out to him that the response was miniscule with a reasonably large advert so it could only get worse with less surface area on the page.

Eventually, he admitted defeat.

So, my first test of offline advertising and it flopped.

However, at least now I know what kind of response to expect from Exchange and Mart.

So, time for a feedback request:

Have you ever run an advert offline to point at a website?

Where did you run it?

Was it expensive?

Was it a success?

Any tips?

Please leave any feedback by clicking on the “Comments” link below. Or, you can email me at the usual address.

In the meantime I am testing and tracking other sources for advertising so please expect some more results in the future…

I’ve recently received several emails about this one. It’s called the “Global Pension Plan” and promises to help you turn €30 into €55,000 or more!

I got the following email and decided to look into it:

“Hi Ben
Could you be kind enough to look into this opportunity for me, what’s your opinon on this one, sounds too good to be true!….has it got scam written all over it? it was passed on to me by friend.
thanks for your time
Phil”

Well, I had a good look at the site and tried to find out who is behind it and what is going on.

Rather than take up space here, please visit the main site:

Global Pension Plan – Is it a Scam?

Once you’ve read the report there, please feel free to comment on this blog or send me an email to the usual address.

Thanks,

Ben

*UPDATE 23/02/2008* – I’ve had to remove some comments as the blog was collapsing under the weight!

These comments have been archived and you can view them here:

Archived Global Pension Plan Comments

*UPDATE 13/11/2008* – I’ve had a few problems with the blog over the past 24 hours which resulted in a restore from backup. Consequently you may find some rogue symbols dotted around the place – especially where there used to be a € or £ sign. Apologies for this but there are far too many for me to correct!

*UPDATE 22/12/2008* – Just for fun: The Global Pension Plan – Stella’s Updates

*UPDATE 16/06/2009* - Now that Stella is gone or dead or whatever – she’s not writing the updates in any case – let’s just remind ourselves of when the final date for GPP is (from the official site):

“20th of November, 2008
Deadline & General update

The Final Deadline: 31st of January 2009
During the last week and half we have been closely in touch with the insurance company and the financier of this project and agreed the final deadline to be set on the above mentioned date. The current turbulent financial climate has created a great pressure to finish the program as soon as possible. This date is absolute and means, that we MUST reach the initially set target of 100.000 qualified members. Otherwise the program closes without payout.”

Note that Stella said “this date is absolute” so it was surprising when the new ‘admin’ posted this:

“10th of May, 2009
Update

Dear Global Pension Plan Members,
As per Trust Partner’s decision, we hereby announce the final closing date of Global Pension Plan: 06/30/2009 That is the 30th of June 2009.
The current number of fully qualified members is only slightly short of the 100.000 limit.
Trust Partner highly appreaciates your efforts and sends you best wishes and luck for the last month and a half.
Sincerely,
Admin”

*UPDATE 26/10/2009* – Apologies for the problems with the blog over the weekend. A new plugin caused the issues. All should be back to normal now…

A week or so ago I posted some free videos about where one particular analyst thought the Dow was going.

Today it is down over 230 points according to Finspreads as I write this at 20:26 UK time.

This video analysis was posted on another blog post and if you did not see it then I highly suggest you should open it today.

The analysis of the Dow was as pertinent then as it is right this second as the Dow falls and falls.

Check out the video below:

Click Here for a Free Video Analysis of the Dow Disaster

I hope the past week has treated you well despite the falling markets.

If like me you spread bet on UK and US shares and indices, it’s been pretty dicey with the markets going down for 5 days in a row.

At the moment I have 11 spread betting positions open – and 10 of them are long bets i.e. I am betting that the share price will increase.

All was going well until last Tuesday some data came out in China or something like that and the market took a bit of a dive (to be honest I don’t quite know what the problem was).

When this happens, it happens quickly because everyone panics.

Luckily I only had one position stop out due to a massive downwards spike in the price.

I made a post on the blog about the markets falling, you can read it here:

Spread Betting Woe as the Markets Fall

This brings me around to talking about Vince Stanzione (again) because this week I got an email from a subscriber who has also bought Vince’s “Making Money From Financial Trading” course in the past.

It read:

“Hi Ben,

many thanks for your thoughts on Vince Stanzione. I’ve fallen for his sales pitch a few times and even bought his Spread Betting course – would you believe, twice!!! The 2006 version is a lot more informative, and more clearly explained than the 2004 version, but I haven’t made any money from this yet. Personally, I think you’d need a “bank” of about £500 which you can afford to risk before making any headway – and, when I have, I’ll try it.

As you probably know, Vince is into other things apart from Spread Betting. Somewhere in my collection I have a DVD of him talking about Direct Mail Marketing, at which he is an expert. He comes across as pretty genuine and down to Earth, and offers to help anyone who contacts him with any queries on any aspect of marketing – copywriting, mailing lists and anything else

Mike”

Mike is correct, Vince has his fingers in a lot of pies including TV, direct mail, consultancy, financial trading, options trading and various other businesses.

I think the DVD that Mike is referring to is one from Pat Adams’ UK Masters Seminars held in 2003/04. I’ve got a number of these DVDs and they are great.

Stanzione also runs a couple of tipster services which I receive invites to join each year but I’ve never took him up on the opportunity. Perhaps one day I should look into it more.

Anyway, it was quite strange that I should get an email about Vince because just last week I was sorting through a load of old videos I have from 99-00. One set is called the “Profitmaker 5” seminar and, as far as I know, it was the first one that Andrew Reynolds held.

Vince appeared on one of the tapes explaining to the audience how to make money from direct mail and the internet. Pretty fascinating stuff.

8 years on from this seminar, Vince is still hard at it and making a fortune. Certainly someone who you should perhaps read more about, even if you aren’t interested in financial trading.

There’s plenty more on the site about Vince:

Vince Stanzione’s Seven Secret Keys Seminar

and

Vince Stanzione and First Information

I recently managed to get hold of the DVDs of Vince’s October 2006 £3k a seat seminar. I will write a review about it soon so if you don’t see anything in the next couple of weeks, give me a nudge!

I’ve had quite a few emails asking for any feedback on the recently advertised “US to UK Deals” seminars from Andrew Reynolds and Tim Lowe.

One came through this week:

“I have had two or three mailing from Tim Lowe & Andrew Reynolds about their USA – UK Deals recently where you purchase licences for the DVDs you can sell on supposedly at a big profit. You know the one, Andrew is over from New York with a great deal for us and Tim Lowe will look after you at the UK end.

They want about 5k for it …you have probably seen this offer. Have you had any feedback on this opportunity? All seems a bit to good to be true but I am aware they are both respected in this field. Do you know anybody who has ever joined up with them and made the sort of money they often talk about?”

I must admit that I have never attended any of these types of seminar but I have seen good feedback from them.

A hour or so after I sent out the latest free business opportunity email newsletter I got the following feedback from one of the subscribers.

The comment was:

“My partner and I both attended Tim Lowe’s Seminar in November re. Andrew Reynold’s US-UK deals and can say that they do deliver what they say. We’ve received the resale rights on a number of DVDs and books and are at the moment in the throes of getting our first product launch up and running. I must admit, though, that it’s not for the faint-hearted. There’s a lot of preparation and research to be done – it’s definitely not a “get-rich-quick” scheme. Nevertheless, I am hopeful of being able to bring in a decent income from it very soon. Maybe it won’t be too long before I can write back with some positives – time will tell!”

Thanks for the response!

If anyone else would like to add any feedback, please click on the link below which says “Comments”