They make the claim, you can have ANYTHING YOU WANT, as that salespitch can seem to apply to anyone who wants anything. So people will pay ANYTHING if they think it will get them everything they want. That is the same salespitch all of the big LGAT's use.
Of course, its not true, but if a person believes its true, then they will spend all the money they have.

And $4,000 is simply the entry fee, they are going to be upsold to coaching contracts, and more seminars in that weekend, until they don't know what's hit them. The upsell is going to be into tens of thousands of dollars, and beyond that.
Whatever you got, they will take it.

Quote
helpme2times
So.... that is a typical grand claim folks like this pitch at some point: "you can have almost anything you want".

In Lakhani's "Persuasion" book, he states the claim more absolutely, in his preface:

"This is a book about persuasion and the art of using persuasion to get exactly what you want."

Er, "get exactly what you want?"
...
Btw, I do NOT recommend joining that teleconference, as you'll be dealing with guys who "persuade" for a living.
Do you really want to risk getting "persuaded" into spending as much as $3997 for 4 days with these guys?

That is nearly FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS.

I can think of so, so many better ways to spend my dough.

A quick follow-up about Good Intentions...the group taking the children from Haiti claims to have had good intentions and didn't know they needed paperwork to take children over a border of a country.
They are lying, of course, that has been known by everyone.

QUOTE: "God is our provider and God gives us strength and comfort," said Carla Thompson, one group member. "We have our Bibles and we are OK."


But that is a good example, of the Good Intentions covert persuasion fraud put forward by Dave Lakhani and Kevin Hogan.
James Arthur Ray also claims to have had good intentions.
Everyone claims to have good intentions when they are taking what they want from you.

This article has a perfect headline...
"Detained Americans say they had good intentions in Haiti" [www.cnn.com]

Just saw a link, that shows proper ethics about amazon affiliate link-clicks.
They explain right there, that if you click from their website to buy their book, they make a little money. [www.mindovermood.com]

For the covert persuaders, just telling the truth is the last thing that crosses their mind. In their advanced influence courses, they teach that you need to make customers FEEL like you are their best friend, to make more sales...its always a manipulative game.

Its like what Ben Franklin said about "rascals".


...If the ras­cals knew the advan­tages of virtue they would become hon­est men out of rascality...Ben Franklin

Quote
The Anticult
Just saw a link, that shows proper ethics about amazon affiliate link-clicks.
They explain right there, that if you click from their website to buy their book, they make a little money. [www.mindovermood.com]

Well how about that... the notice about the money they make on that site is positioned very prominently, right where you click to go to Amazon.... as opposed to the notice Lakhani tacked on at the very bottom of his blog page.

According to this video clip from 2005, 'Dr' Joe Vitale was certified as a hypnotist by 'Dr' Kevin Hogan.
This ring of marketers seems to be getting smaller.

vitale blogspot

Joe Vitale really is at the bottom of the barrell.
The faker Joe Vitale says he learned hypnosis from the faker Kevin Hogan. Joe Vitale is not certified in anything, other than being a certified scammer.

The irony is of course that Joe Vitale is absolutely horrible at hypnosis, and hypno-persuasion. He has no idea of what he is doing.
Its interesting that guys like Joe Vitale who brag they are hypno-persuaders, are in fact just manipulative salesmen and bullshit artists, who are quite clueless about advanced hypno-persuasion.
All he does is just bullshit and exaggerate and try to con people.

Meanwhile, the real experts in hypno-persuasion, like Byron Katie, do it so well that none of their followers even know its happening. They try to deny they are doing it, and they are the experts.

The hacks like Vitale try to brag about it, when in fact they don't know what they are doing.
But it really is a bunch of inbreeding going on, they all feed off eachother.

Dave Lakhani got started up through Joe Vitale, and they are both linked with Kevin Hogan.
It would be interesting to see how Kevin Hogan got into this racket.

Quote
helpme2times
<snip>

Here is Ben Mack in a video testimonial for an "UnSeminar" given by Joe Vitale:

[[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EK-ayCODfQs]www.youtube.com[/url]]

<snip>

Just a little footnote in the interest of accuracy, with no offense or criticism intended or implied: Joe Vitale doesn't put on the Unseminars, Pat O'Bryan does. Joe speaks at most or all of them, as far as I know. Pat O'Bryan is one of Joe's associates and credits Joe's mentoring in internet marketing with turning him from a broke blues guitar player to an internet marketing success story.

This is a fascinating thread - I found it because someone here found a blog post I made and it showed up in my husband's Google Alerts. This is my first post.

I am the Crescent City Gal aka CCGAL

Thanks for listening.

Quote
CCGAL

Quote
helpme2times
<snip>

Here is Ben Mack in a video testimonial for an "UnSeminar" given by Joe Vitale:

[[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EK-ayCODfQs]www.youtube.com[/url]]

<snip>

Just a little footnote in the interest of accuracy, with no offense or criticism intended or implied: Joe Vitale doesn't put on the Unseminars, Pat O'Bryan does. Joe speaks at most or all of them, as far as I know. Pat O'Bryan is one of Joe's associates and credits Joe's mentoring in internet marketing with turning him from a broke blues guitar player to an internet marketing success story.

This is a fascinating thread - I found it because someone here found a blog post I made and it showed up in my husband's Google Alerts. This is my first post.

I am the Crescent City Gal aka CCGAL

Thanks for listening.

Oh my goodness! Hi CCGAL, and thank you for correcting the error re Joe Vitale/Pat O'Bryan, and also for the blogging you did re your unfortunate experience at that event last year.

I agree this is a fascinating thread.... in large part, I dare say, to the knowledge of "The Anticult". A few years ago I nearly got hooked into the approach of a particular "spiritual teacher", but mixed feelings led me to search the internet until I found my way here. At first, I barely knew what TAC was talking about, but over time what he/she said made more and more sense. In hindsight I thought, how could I not have seen these things?

But then no one, or next to no one, knowingly sets out to join a cult or get scammed. I love TAC's description of Vitale as a "cigar-chomping mountebank". Heh. I understand that one of Mr. Fire's latest ventures is a Russian doll for sale which, I kid not, grants wishes.

Wow, I've just found a blog exposing Joe Vitale and associates, put forth by a former supporter. It looks very good. Here is a post explaining the reason for the blog:

[[url=http://mrfirespyre.blogspot.com/2009/11/why-mr-fires-pyre.html]Why Mr. Fire's Pyre[/url]]

Quote
Mr. Fire's Pyre
I guess I wanted to believe.

But then I started seeing the pattern of deceit and how deep it went... the breadth of the deceit throughout his loose organization of siglo marketing partners.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/10/2010 10:34PM by helpme2times.

Just a little more information on this subject, from my perspective, with as little bias as I can manage.

I attended Pat O'Bryan's Unseminar4. I was a loyal customer; I purchased & promoted many of his products.

Just before the election, Pat made some comments on Twitter disparaging Republicans and Conservatives. I reminded him that he had customers and friends who were both Republican and Conservative, and that to continue to make remarks in that vein would likely antagonize and alienate some of his customers who had money to spend with him. He did not stop, and I cut my ties with him.

I wrote about the experience in my blog: [kleppin.blogspot.com] I did not mention his name, but I think it was obvious to whom I was referring, based on my history.

Ben Mack was a speaker at Unseminar 5, and I watched him on the streaming video; some of my friends from U4 were there. My interest in Ben was two-fold: 1) Prestidigitation & 2) Buckminster Fuller. Ben has a history with both.

When Ben announced that he was putting on a seminar he was calling ESP Bootcamp to celebrate his birthday, and the only admission was to purchase & bring a copy of a CD called "The Gentle Art of Cold Reading" - my husband made arrangements for us to attend so I could meet Ben and some of the other people I "knew" online. We drove from Austin to Boise in order to participate.

The night before the event was to officially begin, there was to be a meet up in the bar to watch something on TV. Ben was late, and when he finally arrived it was discovered that he had not made arrangements with the management of the bar to change the channel, and that permission was not going to be granted, so one of the people attending offered to allow everyone to come to her room. Bob and I declined, and went to our own room instead.

I guess in the interest of full disclosure, I should add that Bob and I are both interested in the mechanics and logistics of putting on seminars and workshops, so we were observing and learning from what we were seeing. We were disappointed in the level of professionalism being exhibited, and had no desire to be in a bedroom with strangers at what was supposed to have been a business event. It felt very odd to observe the group agreeing to do that, and we found it hard to believe that we were the only ones who opted to watch the broadcast in the comfort of our own room.

The next morning the event that I wrote about occurred. I believe Ben "culled us from the herd" and that it was a deliberate action in which Dave knowingly participated.

The Twitter notes in this thread from Dave to me were in response to my asking why I had been locked out, and whether or not Dave was aware of the locked door. My point was (and still is) that if he knew about the locked door and was a participant, then he lacked business ethics and professional courtesy, and if he honestly did not know about the locked door, then he had been manipulated by Ben Mack.

Dave called my cell phone and left a message, but we have a difference of opinion as to what an apology is. Saying "I'm sorry you chose to leave" is not "I'm sorry you were mistreated" and I told him that was the equivalent of stabbing someone with a knife and saying "I'm sorry you are choosing to bleed" - and I still feel the same way about it. He kept saying he had apologized, and I kept pointing out that what he had said was NOT the same as a real apology, and I think it angered him tremendously that he was unable to persuade me to do his bidding regarding the phone call. When I broke off all contact, he left an unprofessional and threatening comment on one of my husband's Squidoo lenses, which we saved in case we would need it in court. Interestingly enough, the very next day my CCGAL account at Twitter was mysteriously suspended, although it popped back up about 30 days later.

I suspect that he was shutting me up by registering a complaint with Twitter on top of leaving the nastygram on the Squidoo lens. The complaint I have no proof of, but I can produce the nastygram in court should I need to, and it's probably possible to obtain records from Twitter if the court ordered it.

A few months ago, I found BurnedByFire's Blog entitled Mr. Fire's Pyre, and I have commented a few times. I posted a comment in December, expressing my theory as to why bullies seem to abound in internet marketing circles. You can read it here, if you're interested: [mrfirespyre.blogspot.com] My comments are at numbers 8 and 11, but to really get the entire conversation, I'd recommend reading the post and all of the comments, not just mine.

Quote
CCGAL
I wrote about the experience in my blog: [kleppin.blogspot.com] I did not mention his name, but I think it was obvious to whom I was referring, based on my history.

I did as you suggested and read through the blogs, CCGAL. Whew.

Why is it that I find YOUR side of the story believable?

Thanks for sharing in so much detail.

I thought your blog re Pat ended wonderfully:

Quote

It's not always about who drives the fanciest car or has the highest education - he who dies with the most toys is still dead.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2010 10:54AM by helpme2times.