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Why do the families of internet marketers always seem to need money?


Mike Friedman

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This is going to sound harsh, but this is a recurring thing I have witnessed over the past 15 years or so.

It has happened again last week.

Why is it we so often see these people who are looked at as leaders and influencers in the digital marketing space end up getting some ailment and/or passing away and their families are left financially devastated? These are often highly successful internet marketers (or so they say), yet they seem to be leaving nothing behind for their families.

Now, I get it in the case of someone needing something like an organ transplant, their health insurance sucks, and they are going to be left holding a $75-100k bill at the end of it. That could put a decent dent in someone's finances.

But for the people who pass away... does nobody believe in life insurance? Are none of them taking a few moments for future planning, including loss of income and/or loss of life?

I just have seen so many of these fundraisers go up over the years. I can remember numerous ones at Warrior Forum. I get it if the community wants to band together and do something nice for their family in appreciation of the individual, but so many times there were stories attached of the family now facing severe financial hardship.

I know this sounds callous. 

It feels like it is the ultimate sign of so many frauds in internet marketing.

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Sal was the last we fundraised for at the WF, (RIP) with no additional family members, but l do remember another new member waffling on about some of the situations you mentioned and wanting cash, even though we knew nothing about him, or his family.

Someone showing up on the Warrior F, and telling us how hard up he and his family is, is about the same as an unsolicited email, and we can provide options, but that is all.

B)

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14 hours ago, Tagiscom said:

Sal was the last we fundraised for at the WF, (RIP) with no additional family members, but l do remember another new member waffling on about some of the situations you mentioned and wanting cash, even though we knew nothing about him, or his family.

Someone showing up on the Warrior F, and telling us how hard up he and his family is, is about the same as an unsolicited email, and we can provide options, but that is all.

B)

I did not mean for the post to come off as a Warrior Forum thing. I just mentioned there because I have seen it there a lot in the past. It has happened on plenty of other forums and Facebook groups too. It's not in any way a WF issue. It's an IM'er issue.

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It must be said, just because people who make money online amass a lot of money and are good at what they do, it does not make them more competent at managing their personal finances than anyone else. The absence of a Will for example will lead to the contents of their bank account going to the state, not being made available to their family.  They may have made no provision by having a life insurance policy either.

You could speculate that these people may think themselves successful and invincible to health issues and pass over on the provision details. They are too caught up with their continued success and making even more money. They are self employed. People who work conventional jobs are more inclined to take care of these details. It's not a fanatical 24/7 thing.

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1 hour ago, Lanfear63 said:

It must be said, just because people who make money online amass a lot of money and are good at what they do, it does not make them more competent at managing their personal finances than anyone else. The absence of a Will for example will lead to the contents of their bank account going to the state, not being made available to their family.  They may have made no provision by having a life insurance policy either.

You could speculate that these people may think themselves successful and invincible to health issues and pass over on the provision details. They are too caught up with their continued success and making even more money. They are self employed. People who work conventional jobs are more inclined to take care of these details. It's not a fanatical 24/7 thing.

And that's kind of what I'm wondering. Is it more of a case of lots of IM'ers being absolute horrible with their finances or is it just because of the whole fake-it-till-you-make-it attitude and a lot of IM'ers we think are successful really are not. We just don't know until they pass away. 

There's probably a course idea in there. Financial Planning and Money Management for Internet Marketing Dummies.

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1 hour ago, Mike Friedman said:

And that's kind of what I'm wondering. Is it more of a case of lots of IM'ers being absolute horrible with their finances or is it just because of the whole fake-it-till-you-make-it attitude and a lot of IM'ers we think are successful really are not. We just don't know until they pass away. 

There's probably a course idea in there. Financial Planning and Money Management for Internet Marketing Dummies.

Success to them may just mean that they may be making up to 100k per year from it with minimal input having setup some autopilot schemes and just doing a few emails a week to their list. Now that is great as their work may only constitute 5 to 10 hours a week, which is a very nice lifestyle, so, they see and project themselves as successful. While 100k is a very nice salary and affords some luxurious things in their lives, it is not an impossible thing to earn if you are in a reasonable position in a company, However, that could entail well over 40 hours a week to maintain. 

Then we have the problem of them upping their spending to a higher level to maintain the new lifestyle they want to be living, the dream. Lots of expensive vacations, eating out all the time, expensive clothes. What does not pan out entirely is the assets, like a boat, a more expensive house, a nice car etc. It depends if these were bought by credit, or mortgage etc. If so then the families would lose them if the breadwinner dies. A million a year means being able to buy these things outright, a hundred thousand would probably mean credit to live the dream. So, impoverished families if they died and had not made a will or had life insurance. I think that 100 to 120k is more the norm in IM. There are of course exceptions.  

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12 hours ago, Lanfear63 said:

Success to them may just mean that they may be making up to 100k per year from it with minimal input having setup some autopilot schemes and just doing a few emails a week to their list. Now that is great as their work may only constitute 5 to 10 hours a week, which is a very nice lifestyle, so, they see and project themselves as successful. While 100k is a very nice salary and affords some luxurious things in their lives, it is not an impossible thing to earn if you are in a reasonable position in a company, However, that could entail well over 40 hours a week to maintain. 

Then we have the problem of them upping their spending to a higher level to maintain the new lifestyle they want to be living, the dream. Lots of expensive vacations, eating out all the time, expensive clothes. What does not pan out entirely is the assets, like a boat, a more expensive house, a nice car etc. It depends if these were bought by credit, or mortgage etc. If so then the families would lose them if the breadwinner dies. A million a year means being able to buy these things outright, a hundred thousand would probably mean credit to live the dream. So, impoverished families if they died and had not made a will or had life insurance. I think that 100 to 120k is more the norm in IM. There are of course exceptions.  

Frank Kern has had a 1 million launch, recently, (video may still be on YT) to his list, but he has never brought his family into his business dealings.

And even though he used to personify a persona of beach bum, he recently has stayed with beach bum/business person.

Or a CEO with his surfboard on top of his BMW.

B)

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On 2/2/2021 at 3:00 PM, Mike Friedman said:

And that's kind of what I'm wondering. Is it more of a case of lots of IM'ers being absolute horrible with their finances or is it just because of the whole fake-it-till-you-make-it attitude and a lot of IM'ers we think are successful really are not. We just don't know until they pass away. 

There's probably a course idea in there. Financial Planning and Money Management for Internet Marketing Dummies.

I noticed the same thing. Fund raising for marketers.  I've seen it on forums, Facebook, and I've gotten e-mails.  So....what happened to their money?

 

Sometimes they lie. Maybe most times.

Sometimes it's that they state gross sales as an income claim. They don't deduct all their costs.

Sometimes they do one day launches that take months to set up.. So they make $50,000 in a day, but they can only do two a year....and everyone remembers that they "make $50,00 a day".

They actually do make good money, but get lazy.

And most people have no idea how to handle a large income. So they buy a boat, motorcycles, and go on vacations....They never really invest money, save for retirement, or buy life insurance. And even people that are making a good living....quit. If you are used to earning $20,000 a year, and you suddenly earn $20,000 a month, you don't know what to do. You are now way out of your comfort zone. And you...amazingly....sabotage yourself to get back to "normal". 

There are also lots of Gurus (outside of IM) that really had successful careers, and then stop for whatever reason.......they lose their audience, their method of marketing stops working (like FAX blasts), or laws change that take away their selling vehicle (like buying cheap time for infomercials). 

How many Mail Order Gurus are left. How many real estate gurus are there left? How many Lottery winners are still rich?

I made large sums of money selling vacuum cleaners in people homes. That entire industry is essentially gone. For some people (that have experienced something similar), starting over is hard. So some people live off their savings, and by the time it's gone, they are no longer the same person. Marketing, technology, and their customer base has moved on. 

And, as hard as it is to say, some people at 60 are no longer the same people they were at 40.  

 

 

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42 minutes ago, Claude Whitacre said:

There are also lots of Gurus (outside of IM) that really had successful careers, and then stop for whatever reason.......they lose their audience, their method of marketing stops working (like FAX blasts), or laws change that take away their selling vehicle (like buying cheap time for infomercials). 

That's funny. I was just thinking about FAX blasts last week. Some FAX blasters years ago were trying to do something along the lines of what the WallStreetBets Reddit community did. Now, they weren't taking on hedge funds and making them pay for shorting stocks, but they were trying to drum up interest in penny stocks. 

I remember when I worked in banking, just our branch used to get about 5 of them a day. They didn't have a cause other than trying to get the stocks to go up a few cents and then dumping all their shares with a decent profit. 

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So if you are reading this thread, you have people who depend on you, and you have not done it yet, get yourself a quote on some term life insurance. It's not that expensive to make sure the people you leave behind will not be wondering how they are going to make ends meet. 

If you have no dependents, screw it. Do whatever you want with your money.

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On 2/6/2021 at 2:53 PM, Mike Friedman said:

So if you are reading this thread, you have people who depend on you, and you have not done it yet, get yourself a quote on some term life insurance. It's not that expensive to make sure the people you leave behind will not be wondering how they are going to make ends meet. 

If you have no dependents, screw it. Do whatever you want with your money.

An interesting thing about Term insurance. Less than 1% of the policies sold are ever paid on. It isn't that the company tries to cheat anyone. But here is what happens....

The average live insurance policy is paid on for 8 years before it is dropped. And that means no claim on the insurance. Life insurance policies are very easy to stop paying on.

The insured person goes into the hospital...forgets to pay the premium...and the policy lapses (cancels for non-payment), So there is nothing to pay on.

And often, the person dies, and the survivors didn't know about the life insurance. A month or so later, the policy cancels out (for lack of payment) and it becomes a worthless piece of paper. 

A term life insurance policy has a great rate, until the term is up. If you're still alive when the term is up (nearly everyone is), nobody keeps paying the premiums. They are sky high just so you'll cancel the policy. And all the money you paid is kept as pure profit.

For example, I have a million dollar 20 year term policy that costs me about $450 a month. That 20 years will be up in about 2 years. After that, the rate hikes to about $4,000 a month. Of course, I'll stop paying the month before that. And hopefully, all the money I put into it will be wasted. The sole purpose of the insurance was to guarantee that my wife would get our desired retirement income, whether I make it or not. 

If you're ever wondering how you can buy a $500,000 term life insurance policy for $30 a month. Those are the reasons.  So, if you are going to buy a term life policy, make sure it's a term long enough so it covers you until retirement age.

 

Added later; I just had to know...

That $450 a month I've been paying on the term life insurance? If I would have simply invested it in our no load Index mutual fund......We'd have an additional $385,281.78 in two years.

Damn.  Damn, Damn, Damn. Of course, there was about a 35% chance  (sorry. I was wrong. It's a 30% chance)  I wouldn't have lived this long....so, there is that.

 

Added later still;

Did you know that in 1900, only 25% of babies lived to 65 years old? Now it's 70%. And once a man lives to 65, he has an average of 18 more years of life.

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19 hours ago, Claude Whitacre said:

That $450 a month I've been paying on the term life insurance? If I would have simply invested it in our no load Index mutual fund......We'd have an additional $385,281.78 in two years.

Damn.  Damn, Damn, Damn. Of course, there was about a 35% chance I wouldn't have lived this long....so, there is that.

And if you had done the honorable thing 10 years ago, she would have had $1 million, which today in the same fund would be worth about $1.5 million. So there is also that.

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3 hours ago, Mike Friedman said:

And if you had done the honorable thing 10 years ago, she would have had $1 million, which today in the same fund would be worth about $1.5 million. So there is also that.

OK, I just spend a couple of hours trying to think of a good comeback. I got nothing. 

 

by the way, did you know that life insurance policies pay off on suicides after the first two years? 

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Back to the subject at hand.

Something that really irritates me...

I post on Forums, and a "guru" sends me a private message telling me how much they appreciate my posts. But the message is maybe 6 long paragraphs.

So I instantly know they are asking me for something. Either they want me to teach them something for free...they want me to join them in some business venture...or (usually), they want to borrow money.

 

If they want me to give them advice, and I can do it quickly, I will. A joint venture? probably not, but I'll read it.  But asking for money? No. Never. No story will convince me.  

I ignore those messages. And I write off that person as a lost cause. Asking a stranger for money...because you think they have money, is an act of desperation. And I never loan money to anyone. It always turns bad. Always. Not relatives, not friends (my friends don't need to borrow), not "fans", and not strangers.  This well is dry.

 

Anyway, it happened again recently, and it ticks me off. (No. It wasn't here).

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1 hour ago, Claude Whitacre said:

Back to the subject at hand.

Something that really irritates me...

I post on Forums, and a "guru" sends me a private message telling me how much they appreciate my posts. But the message is maybe 6 long paragraphs.

So I instantly know they are asking me for something. Either they want me to teach them something for free...they want me to join them in some business venture...or (usually), they want to borrow money.

 

If they want me to give them advice, and I can do it quickly, I will. A joint venture? probably not, but I'll read it.  But asking for money? No. Never. No story will convince me.  

I ignore those messages. And I write off that person as a lost cause. Asking a stranger for money...because you think they have money, is an act of desperation. And I never loan money to anyone. It always turns bad. Always. Not relatives, not friends (my friends don't need to borrow), not "fans", and not strangers.  This well is dry.

 

Anyway, it happened again recently, and it ticks me off. (No. It wasn't here).

 

Completely agree. The worst in my mind are the people who want to pitch me their "amazing idea" and have me help them. It always involves me doing all the marketing for them, out of my own pocket, in exchange for 20% of the profits or some other ridiculous number.

They fail to realize that the marketing and building the sales process is the hardest and most important part. Also, generally the most expensive. I always counter with an estimate of what it would cost for them to hire me or an offer where I get 90% ownership. Then I ask if I should start working up a finalized quote or start having my lawyer draw up the paperwork for the ownership transfer.

They usually get mad when I tell them I'm not interested in working for free. Not even for free. I'm the one making a significant investment in time and money to get the marketing started. So I would be operating at a loss until the idea takes off, if it ever does.

The worst is the ones that do not even have any kind of original idea. In those cases, I always ask them, "Well, what do I need you for?"

They'll respond with something like, "It was my idea."

"No. It was XYZ's idea. You are just copying it."

 

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On 2/8/2021 at 3:02 PM, Claude Whitacre said:

OK, I just spend a couple of hours trying to think of a good comeback. I got nothing. 

 

by the way, did you know that life insurance policies pay off on suicides after the first two years? 

I notice that you may be interested in my: "Make It Seem Like Suicide Package"

Don't want the hassle of a lengthy murder investigation while your wife awaits a long time for the payout?

Can't bring yourself to commit suicide because your too scared to do it?

Well this is for you....

First, we carefully craft a beautifully worded suicide note in your own forged handwriting outlining the futility of your existence and signed by you. Then at a designated location and time our experts will stealthfully  approach and  fire into your arm a strong narcotic via a tiny undetectable needle dart and will quickly knock you out, you won't feel a thing. The narcotic will disperse quickly before any autopsy can take place. Next, wearing Hazmat suits, our experts will arrange for you to be sitting in your chair with a shotgun barrel in your mouth. Using your own fingers, the trigger will be pulled, the perfect suicide, no one will ever detect foul play. 

All this for only 50k (payable in advanced)

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39 minutes ago, Mike Friedman said:

 

Completely agree. The worst in my mind are the people who want to pitch me their "amazing idea" and have me help them. It always involves me doing all the marketing for them, out of my own pocket, in exchange for 20% of the profits or some other ridiculous number.

They fail to realize that the marketing and building the sales process is the hardest and most important part. Also, generally the most expensive.

Same here. They offer 20% if i do the easy work of copywriting, marketing, and selling to my list. Sometimes I'll ask "If you buy a $20 book, how much do you think the author made?" Of course, they think the author got at least 80%...maybe all of it.

I say "No. The author, after doing all the writing and editing...after agreeing to pay his own expenses to promote the book in bookstores...gets between 5% and 10% of the book. He may make $1.50 off of each book. Why? Printing, binding, and marketing the book is the business. It's 95% of the work, and all the expense.".

 

But for guys that have no marketing experience at all...who have never done any real business....offering 20% of an unproven offer makes perfect sense. 

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34 minutes ago, Lanfear63 said:

I notice that you may be interested in my: "Make It Seem Like Suicide Package"

Don't want the hassle of a lengthy murder investigation while your wife awaits a long time for the payout?

Can't bring yourself to commit suicide because your too scared to do it?

Well this is for you....

First, we carefully craft a beautifully worded suicide note in your own forged handwriting outlining the futility of your existence and signed by you. Then at a designated location and time our experts will stealthfully  approach and  fire into your arm a strong narcotic via a tiny undetectable needle dart and will quickly knock you out, you won't feel a thing. The narcotic will disperse quickly before any autopsy can take place. Next, wearing Hazmat suits, our experts will arrange for you to be sitting in your chair with a shotgun barrel in your mouth. Using your own fingers, the trigger will be pulled, the perfect suicide, no one will ever detect foul play. 

All this for only 50k (payable in advanced)

You're too late. My wife has proposed the exact same plan...several times. I assume you and she use the same service.

 

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8 hours ago, Claude Whitacre said:

Back to the subject at hand.

Something that really irritates me...

I post on Forums, and a "guru" sends me a private message telling me how much they appreciate my posts. But the message is maybe 6 long paragraphs.

So I instantly know they are asking me for something. Either they want me to teach them something for free...they want me to join them in some business venture...or (usually), they want to borrow money.

 

If they want me to give them advice, and I can do it quickly, I will. A joint venture? probably not, but I'll read it.  But asking for money? No. Never. No story will convince me.  

I ignore those messages. And I write off that person as a lost cause. Asking a stranger for money...because you think they have money, is an act of desperation. And I never loan money to anyone. It always turns bad. Always. Not relatives, not friends (my friends don't need to borrow), not "fans", and not strangers.  This well is dry.

 

Anyway, it happened again recently, and it ticks me off. (No. It wasn't here).

Can l borrow $50 bucks!

:P

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  • 1 month later...
On 2/7/2021 at 3:53 AM, Mike Friedman said:

So if you are reading this thread, you have people who depend on you, and you have not done it yet, get yourself a quote on some term life insurance. It's not that expensive to make sure the people you leave behind will not be wondering how they are going to make ends meet. 

If you have no dependents, screw it. Do whatever you want with your money.

Yes, the best thing to do is get a life insurance

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