PPC Classroom 2.0 Review
Thursday, February 26, 2009 at 1:16PM ;)
I've just subscribed to PPC Classroom 2.0. Haven't had a chance to go through all the material yet but so far it looks pretty good - much better than Commission Blueprint - the last program of this sort I bought (and got a refund after a week).
You might want to put me on an RSS feed as I'll be blogging here daily about what I've discovered on PPC Classroom 2.0.
I was hesitant to join this program at first. I was spammed daily by the Usual Suspects but it wasn't until Brad Callen offered me two of his products for free if I signed up for PPC Classroom that I weakened. Haven't heard back from Callen yet. We'll see. I'm not particularly bothered as he's taught me a lot about S.E.O. for free and I've never bought any of his products - Affiliate Elite/Keyword Elite/SEO Elite et al.
There is one thing I'm a bit wary of though. They promoted this product by saying you could join for free after you paid the Shipping & Handling on a DVD they send you - in my case, as I live in Paris, France, it was about $10. But there's ALWAYS a catch isn't there? There's no such thing as a free lunch. What they do in this case it to immediately try to upsell you with stuff you MUST ABSOLUTELY HAVE to get the full benefit of the course. At another $97 a month. So they give you a month of the course for free - after capturing your credit card details - and then you're charged $19.90 a month after that unless you cancel before the month is up. Add to that another $97 a month for whatever it is, plus another $97 for 3 supposedly HOT niche products...and then add another "refundable" $97 for a Live Event in Vegas. It all adds up doesn't it? So we'll see.
Oh yeah. You know what the 3 HOT niche products are for this month? - Tattoos, Panic Attacks and Fat Loss. Hardly earth-shattering is it? I've already checked out all those markets and they are super-competitive. And I can't for the life of me understand why someone would pay for an ebook on panic attacks and anxiety attacks. Especially when you can find all sorts of free resources on the web. But I guess the world is full of dumb schmucks eh?
Malcolm Lambe
Well that was another false trail. I've just cancelled. Really there is nothing new here. It's nicely presented (for the most part) but that's as far as it goes. I've read all the modules, watched the slick videos, perused the worthless bonuses. Here's one of them by-the-way. ;)
They reckon three flowcharts like this piece-of-shit are worth $1000. Laughable - I can't see anyone making a killing using these methods. Anyway...let's see how long it takes them to reply to my support ticket. If they dare to bill me I'm going to go absolutely apeshit.
So No, I can't recommend this program. You're better off buying Perry Marshall's "Definitive Guide to Google Adwords" - probably where these guys got their start anyway. And it's only $49. Press this button to blow up Iran - 
Talking of flow-charts - there's a better one over at Adword Accelerator. You'll find it under "Adwords Success Blueprint". That's a very good tool AdwordAccelerator - I use it all the time but it's not cheap - $37 a month or $299 a year. Comes down to whether you're serious or just mucking around. Adwords can cost you a lot of money if you don't know what you are doing.
Malcolm Lambe
Here's a copy of the support ticket I sent these guys -
Please cancel me from your program that I signed up for two days ago. It's not for me. Very disappointing. Please DO NOT bill my VISA card in my name Malcolm Lambe (ending in ****). You've promised the world here but really you've taken me nowhere. And the 3 HOT monthly niches? You kidding? Fat-Loss, Tattoos and Panic Attacks? Come on.
I would quote a receipt # but you haven't supplied one.
And they reply?
Malcolm,You have been refunded for your purchases.
Thanks,
PPC Classroom 2.0 Support
Weird eh? Not one attempt at trying to keep me on. No "Sorry you're disappointed. We hate to see you go. Can you tell us specifically which parts of the course you don't like? We can almost guarantee you'll make money if you hang in there. In fact we'll give you another free months trial if you'll reconsider. Cheers, Amit & Ahmet."
Glad I'm out of it.
Malcolm Lambe
Google Cash Detective
Joined Chris Carpenter's GCD ysterday. Very expensive but they have this insane software that lets you snoop on other affiliate accounts and clone their successful campaigns. Looks very promising. MUCH better than Affiliate Elite/PPC Spy/PPC Shadow - all that other half-baked stuff that's out there. I'm very impressed with this. Great video training too. He seems to crank out a new vid every second day. Support responds quickly as well (take note Brad Callen).
Google Cash Detective from Chris Carpenter involves Direct Linking from your Adwords spots using your affiliate link - something Google frowns on but can't do much about. I'll be blogging daily on this elsewhere on this blog. Find the post when I do and RSS me. I'm not mucking around - the cost of the program is $997 up front and then another $97 a month for starters. Add in the Adwords spend and we're talking real money here. Not for the faint of heart.
STOP PRESS: it sucks. More in a dedicated thread later...
Reader Comments (15)
"Press this button to blow up Iran" - Thanks for the great laugh.
Great Post
I joined the PPC classroom to get the free programs from Brad Callen.
He came through with the free programs. I haven't unsubscribed yet, really I haven't read much of the site-I blew them off after they started loading my e-mail box with junk.
I need to get to it and send in my cancellation ticket.
I agree that Perry Marshalls guide is much better.
At least I found one of his books in an actual book store.
I used it to set up a few PPC ads when I was selling Mary Kay-
I actually got quite a few sales from it.
Yeah I eventually got his free crappy programs and promptly trashed them. That guy needs to go and look up the meaning of "Customer Support". Google his name and you'll see he's wanking on about being more open and up front and easily contactable through Facebook/Twitter etc. Load of bollocks. Filed under "C" for conman.
Hey guy- I really will love to hear all about if you're having some success with GCD! No way I could afford it but I am rooting for you!
@ Pat
It's an interesting tool but so far I'm not having any success. They've had a lot of problems with the launch and there are a lot of things they've promised that are not happening. The Forum isn't working. The so-called "blog" is just a webpage. Other stuff promised is not there. "Contact" links are dead. So-called "Bonuses" are rubbish that's been floating around the web for a while. They are not answering any comments on the videos and it's IMPOSSIBLE to get hold of anyone. Support takes days to answer and when they do its not much help. Not a very good start. We couldn't even Log In for the first couple of days. You would expect better service for your $997 plus $97 a month. Not very impressed. I'm thinking of bailing. I Googled "Google Cash Detective" and read some really disparaging reports from his last launch. This Blog I'm beginning to think Chris Carpenter is just another internet conman - I hope I'm wrong.
Funny thing is, GCD is all about Direct Linking but they supply you with "review templates" and talk about building pages and sites. I suspect Google is not really that keen on direct affiliate linking. You also need a History with Google to get the .05 cents bids and Good Quality Score. Google is a funny beast - they recommend you add certain keywords and then they don't run them. Or they give you a Quality Score of 8 on a keyword and then don't run it. Very hit and miss.
I've tried cloning existing so-called "successful" campaigns using GCD - using their keywords and ad copy - but so far it hasn't worked. I think Google is smarter than we think.
Jeeze Malcom-
I hope that they get everything up and running at GCD! I would really hate to think that Chris is just another scammer. Can you imagine all of the ticked off people getting refunds if they don't shape up! He'd never be able to sell another thing online I would think. I appreciate you keeping us updated on your experiences.
I've asked for refund. Fed up with all the broken promises/misrepresentation. Found the tool to be not that accurate. You're better off with the free Adwords Keyword Tool imo.
Got a form email today from Carpenter which says in part
"For the last several months, we have handled very few customer
support tickets per day. In fact, I did most of them. When we
had the server crashes last Tuesday, the whole system was
flooded, and I lost the ability to keep up with customer service.
Right now we have 500 open tickets, and I've put together a team
to start working through them tonight. We will get to everyone,
so please be patient.
Ultimately, I want to be fielding questions that are left as comments
on the training videos so that I can share the information with
ALL the members instead of privately via email."
Inept at best. You think he would have learnt from the last Launch disaster. If you were a complete starry-eyed beginner you might cop this bullshit. But c'mon $2600 over a year he wanted to take from me and this is the treatment I get.
Oh yeah...he's going to give everybody a week of free billing. Whoopee-doo.
Man that is SO much of a bummer. I was looking forward to hearing some positive news coming out of GCD. I guess it's pretty plain to me that I really can't judge what's real and what's total BULL online! =) I totally appreciate your straight shooting on this though! Now let's see how many others actually come forward with the truth of what has gone on behind the scenes of that very expensive drama!
Read what we're saying on the Warrior Forum
I learned more from a little course called Google Cash from Ryan Deiss & Perry Belcher than most of the hundreds of programs out there. Some of my Keywords have Quality scores of 9 & 10 and convert at over 80% costing me as little as 0.03 in the "make money" with IM category.
The secret is simple really - 1 or 2 targeted keywords per ad per single landing page. Each adgroup with its own different couple of keywords and its own landingpage. So you end up with a bazillion landing pages focussed on your keywords. Start bids high , let it run 2 days and lower bids till you are still on page 1 but not ist spot .Spots 4 to 9 are still good
Another guy to check out is Jonny Andrews from Money Siphon - also great PPC training value . Down to earth no BS good tips.Hope this helps someone
Very good tips from Michael J, above.
Sooner or later, I suspect you will get around to looking into and probably doing a far job at reviewing PPC Kauna. Since I have already paid the green-backs for BOTH PPC Classroom and The Detective and Kahuna, I thought I'd post this comment to "nudge" you to peek behind the curtain at what Patrick is doing and give you a heads up that THIS suite of tools can compete toe-to-toe with the Detective and Anik's stuff (plus) Patrick won't bore you with countless backend upsale efforts every 30 seconds.
Yes guys- I agree about lots of people giving ppc kahuna a go. I did a review site because I was actually a beta tester and found it to be pretty in depth teaching instead of just a tool that newbies will get in trouble using if they don't know what they're doing. Not saying that I have mastered ppc by any means here. lol. But I know with the lessons, videos and tools that are in the members area, people have a really great chance to learn the game and what it really takes to be successful in running campaigns.
You might be interested to know that my Adwords A/C was HACKED overnight - for real. Some A-hole created a new campaign (for cheap air tickets) with a DAILY budget of €2000 at a bid of $1.90 per click. Its cost me €220. Waiting to see what GOOOOGLE are going to do about it. But looks like they've already billed me for it.
Daaaamn that stinks Malcolm!