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Ok, yes, I tried this service, and I wanted to provide my personal usocial review, for my followers, so they can learn from my experiences. I buy so much stuff… really. I’m a sucker for a solid sales pitch. That being said, a few of those sales pitches have panned out and made me an internet marketing guru, so no complaints.

What you need to know … is who the hell is valuing a facebook fan at $3.60? Really? Is that what the populist thoughts are? Is that what the crazy corporate world is willing to pay? Because let me tell you, Metric wise, and ROI wise, I would rate them worth a few cents at best. Nowhere near the ROI of a controlled medium.

Not to devalue their worth, but they are a small part of my marketing muscle (and I recommend the same for you), and while I’m quite the facebook “fan”, and believe they are going to take over the world with their new “like” button (more on that later), there’s no way a facebook fan is worth that much to me. And yes, I have several facebook pages that are large … Of course, I no longer have Fans - I have people that “Like” me. And that’s a great change, but still, no way I’m giving my “likes” that much value.

However, let’s get to the Uscocial Review, and my personal experiences. Far be it from me to take everyone else’s word for it, as the web is strewn with awful reviews for this service, I had to try it myself.

Being MarketingCrazy, I didn’t try their smallest package. Oh no, I tried their largest package. Let me give you stats …

After 2 Months

After 20+ Emails

After 6 Responses

After 4 Broken Dates and Promises

I haven’t gotten a single “fan”, or a single “like”. Um, did they just take my money and actually not give me anything return, and stop answering my emails? Yes, yes they did. Seems crazy right? But that’s what happened to me. They simply took the money, and stopped responding, and did no work.

So, while I’d love to say something positive, there was not a single positive experience I had with this company. That’s too bad. Beware my experiences, or be doomed to repeat them. I hope I save you a clean $1000 by telling you what happened.

Good Luck, I’m off to get scammed again - as my public service, just to keep you in the know. And that’s my Usocial Review.  Man, that’s like 3 times this year … I’m on a roll.

The day after Underground Seminar, List Control video four closes me.  It wasn’t the first three videos, nor the software (which I’d been using for years), but it was video 4. That did it. Damn, it was good. I’m ready to purchase …

Now, let me first state. I’m not promoting the course. I may buy it for myself, but I am not posting my affiliate link, nor am I trying to pitch you on it. It’s 2k - and for many, that’s simply a crazy amount of money (see below though). However, I thought I’d share with people the fact that, yes, I’m going to do it.

My greatest fear is that I already know everything there is to know about list building. However, the desire to continue learning, and perhaps, find things that have eluded me in my ten plus years, or simply to keep myself involved, is enough for me to pull the trigger and get the course.

It will be the first internet course this year, and likely the only course I get. However, to be honest, the other main selling point was the event in San Diego. I love San Diego, and having an excuse to go down there and party - well, that’s was a major selling point for me. I tend to learn a lot at conferences, as my last three posts have probably affirmed, so the chance to go to one more this year, and learn three more essential skills of internet marketing, was too good to pass up.

In truth, 2k is nothing. I don’t mean to belittle the cost, however, compared to a single year in school, or any other training program which teaches you how to make money, or actively “do” just about anything, it’s really fairly typical. In the internet marketing world, it’s considered a lot. In the Stanford, or even UC Berkeley world of real life education, its’ a drop in the bucket. It’s hard to say which one is more valuable in life, however, it’s easy to say which one will likely net your more immediate income.

Frank’s product is at http://www.listcontrolsite.com, and that’s a straight link (no affiliate stuff). If you get the course, please let me know, as I’d like to have people to compare notes with. My single fear is that there will be nothing new for me here, and in essence, it will take my TIME away from me (which is by far my greatest asset).

If you are purchasing, do a search of the warrior forum to see if any bonus offers appeal to you. I think most are horrible, as they are even more time draining (offering more courses, or added bits and pieces that take more of your time). That being said, Jeff Johnson’s might be ok, and I may purchase through his link (for the ability to have his team build me a site “their way”). Not sure I believe that, but I’ll give it a fair shake.

This boils down to me feeling that I’m moving forward, becoming more involved, investing in my education, after my years of travel, I want my playtime to be over. I want to be invested in something. Houses, cars, hotels, spas, they’re all great - but I’m over it (almost … I think …). I won’t do it at the expense of wasting my time however, so if the course doesn’t deliver, you can expect to hear about it.

Hope You Join me! List Control …

Whew, I made it! And it’s simply no fun to take a red eye flight from SFO, let me tell you. But, like most time’s I leave for a convention, there was an immediate surge of productivity (even on the plane ride here).

First off, new versions of tweetdeck, hootsuite, and socialoomph are installed on my laptop(s), and my iphone, and blackberry where possible. I’m not big into social media (as I’ve told you previously, it’s a case of ROI), but I really threw myself into it for this week, to see what results may happen (if any). The Underground online seminar twitter feed hastag is #UG6, and my username is … MarketingCrazy.

This is the pre-day, but my head is already swimming with ideas. I wasn’t too psyched about this year’s pre-day, since it’s geared towards younger entrepreneurs, and I’m very, very, old (ok, so not THAT old. So far, I’m enjoying it far more than I thought I would, and even though there’s NOT a lot of meat (if any) in the presentations, there’s a ton of inspiration and stories that are truly motivating. It’s a pre-day … I came for the random piece of info, and so far, I’m very happy I did.

This hotel is great! It’s in a part of DC I have never been to, and I love the location and the rooms, and all the free perks (including pay once coffee - free refills all day!).  Expect me to be very wired …

My conference travel pack now consists of a: Macbook Pro 13′, a Thinkpad Edge (Red/AMD), my iphone, my crackberry, my flip camera and that’s it (isn’t that enough?). Shortly, I’ll be adding the Ipad to my road warrior arsenal as well as the latest Thinkpad X301 series when released.

Things are happening … If you’re here, direct message me at #MarketingCrazy on Twitter, or email to MarketingCrazy@gmail.com …

Ok, I had to share this! Hot on the heels of my post, Yanik Silver sends out an email blowing the lid off of what’s really going on at many supposed internet marketing conferences. Ok, so maybe not blowing the lid, as almost everyone knows this … but MAYBE you didn’t.

He says it better than me, so I’m going to reprint his email here (and put in my affiliate links to go to the seminar), but I really hope you listen. It’s so disheartening to see so many people go to seminars where the sold goal (aptly executed) is to get you to have an emotional buying response (over-riding your common sense), spend a lot of money at each speaker’s “presentation”, and leave (often) in more dire circumstances than when you came.

Here’s the scoop, direct from my email, to your ears and eyes (care of Yanik Silver’s hand):

Good morning Agent Evan:

I’m about to reveal confidential and privileged information that you probably won’t hear from anyone else (and I know some people definitely won’t like the fact I’m breathing a single word about this).

You see, I’ve been on the inside of a lot of seminars as a guest speaker and know
exactly how the ‘game’ works.

Here’s the deal: The host will invite a bunch of people to speak at their conference with two considerations in mind. #1 - How large their list is to promote the event and #2 - How well they can sell product at the back of the room.

For the most part (with very few exceptions) it’s true and here’s the other dirty secret…

Most speakers are not paid one thin dime to show up at these events. They have to pay their own pay for travel, hotel and meals. So before they even step foot on stage they are hundreds if not thousands in the hole. That means the only way for them to get compensated for showing up is to sell, sell, sell! Usually this translates to the fact they *have* to spend lots of time pitching their products and services. Really hammering the audience getting them to buy. Essentially their presentation is a thinly veiled commercial.

Why am I telling you all of this?

To show you yet another reason the Underground® seminar is different. I’m paying for the speakers to be there. I’m picking up the tab on their airfare, hotel and taking them out to some awesome dinners. They’re not there to sell you their products or services. (In fact, many of them have nothing to sell.)

Plus, I didn’t pick my speakers for their ability to fill the room. Many of them couldn’t
sell one ticket because their lists could give a flying fig about Internet marketing. I chose them strictly for the content they’d deliver to you for their real-world ventures.

—

http://www.UGOSeminar.com

—

Actually I’m so serious about delivering immediately useful content here - that I’m even putting up $10k of my own money. You get to vote for the speaker who gave you the most directly impactful information you can take straight to the bank. The winner is going to be awarded ‘Top Underground Marketer’ and they get a huge plaque. Plus they get a $10,000.00 check that goes to their favorite charity. (THEY sure don’t need the money!)

Now I can tell you one thing for sure - most of these guys and gals are super competitive. That means, they are going to go all out trying to outdo one another vying for “the crown” while you sit back and soak it all in.

Remember this event is not bringing in the same usual ”suspects”. I’ve managed to
uncover a secretive group of real-people making real money online *NOT* selling “how to make money online” info.

These ‘under-the-radar’ successes don’t advertise their accomplishments because they don’t need to nor want to. They are quite content to make their money “in the dark”  (while keeping their mouths shut and their secrets very close to the vest).

Look, it only takes one good idea to make this worth it for you. Don’t you think from a group of people selling $30 million online, all the incredible attendees and VIP guests you might pick up one or two new ideas?

My Internet buddies attending are coming here to learn NOT to socialize in the back-of-the-room like at typical seminars. And you can bet I’ll be taking tons of notes too.

http://www.UGOSeminar.com

February 3, 2010:

This is huge because you’ll save a full $1000.00 before the price increase but more
importantly the biggest bonus of all will vanish if you miss this deadline… When you sign http://www.UGOSeminar.com

Hopefully - I’ll see you there!

And that’s what he wrote me, and like he, I hope I see ya’ there….

Wow, can Apple market or what? I don’t have much time, but here’s my thoughts about the Apple Ipad, and while not a review of the device, I have to say …

Why did you have to, overnight, kill my Kindle and make it worthless? Why, Amazon, did you not innovate in TWO years after creating such an innovative device? Any Why (Amazon), did Kindle EVER have a keyboard? These questions may never be answered, as the game is over. Apple Wins.

They haven’t yet gotten to price, or connectivity, two very important aspects of the new device, but so far, I am very impressed with battery life (yay - but still does not have replaceable battery), games, screen, books, and portability factor.

The event is hot, and from a marketing standpoint, well - we could study Apple for a decade. However, remember, it boils down to exceptional products that are amazing. They market well, but their products also speak for themselves. Yes, there’s much we can learn here about marketing, but we have to create amazing, life changing products, first and foremost.

So, the Apple Ipad is unveiled … Back to the event.  More Soon!