Internet Business Ethics 101 – Eric Graham Rip Off Scam

Class Sit up pay attention, you’re about to learn something… Something I’ve paid dearly to learn, but you don’t have to… as long as you pay attention and heed my advice.

Being a victim is a hard pill to swallow. No one likes to admit they were a victim. Criminals, rapists, child molesters, conmen and the like know this and count on the fact that a lot of their victims will not make public what happened to them. Knowing this, they live free to strike again another day.

There are plenty of fake gurus, lame products, and “takers” in the Internet Business, home business, and marketing arena these days that count on the same quirks in our human nature to get away ripping people off. Over the last few years I’ve been taken in by one… I’ll name names below, but keep reading for now.

Hardly an hour goes by without an email showing up in my inbox (just think how many were trapped by my spam filter) hawking the latest plan, formula, or product that just earned someone hundreds of thousands dollars in just minutes or days without doing much of anything. These are obvious lame products, yet people still fall for them. It’s hard to imagine, but people still fall for the Nigerian scam letter from the wife of the late Mr. x who was the so and so in charge of so and so’s vast fortune…

Before I go any farther, let me say that there are honest and ethical people in this business. In fact, I would bet that most are. Just like a barrel of apples, one rotten one can ruin the whole thing. It’s a shame that one or two rotten apples can tarnish those who go out of their way to help others and to make sure their products and services are first class.

If you’re really sharp and have followed my blog for a while, you’ve noticed I’ve removed a few names from my blog roll. One of the names I’ve removed lately is Eric Graham, The Conversion Doctor.

I have a DVD product in which I interview Eric, it’s called Masters of Online Income – The Eric Graham Interview – I’m pulling that product from the market today – the last day of 2009.

Why? Because I no longer feel comfortable promoting or being associated with Eric in anyway. Over the past year my opinion of him has steadily dropped. You’re known by the company you keep and if I’m selling a DVD that features me interviewing Eric, people will assume that I approve of his business tactics and dealings – I do not.

The DVD we made contains good material. I worked hard to create it, and have never recouped what I paid for the time I spent with Eric – but I don’t want to sell it anymore. There’s nothing dishonest in the material on the DVD, and if you have one, it contains good advice. But I feel uncomfortable selling it.
What exactly happened?

I have followed Eric’s blog for some time. He calls himself the “Conversion Doctor” because he has performed hundreds of tests on his web sites and his client’s web sites to determine what factors will improve your sales. The things he’s suggested that I’ve tested tend to be true.

The truth is, I paid for one of his packages that included a day together followed by a year of email coaching (among other things) and he has not followed through on his end of the deal. I’ve since been in contact with others who have had the same experiences. In fact, there are several complaints to be found from his dissatisfied clients (I’ll give the link to a few below).

From time to time Eric promotes a “special” on a “package” that includes some variation of a day-long visit where he would flies into your town and spends the day working with you. Usually the package is combined with 6 months to a year of email coaching, 2 to 4 phone calls and / or web meetings, creation of joint ventures, new products, offloading his overflow of copywriting work to you, opening the doors to you to other “big” names in the Internet Business arena from his “huge” rolodex, etc. In the video promoting the package I purchased, he totals up its value to be around $47,000 and offers to discount it to $4,997 if you’ll provide a video testimonial of how much he’s helped your business. The day-long visit can be used for anything – working on your business, creating new products, etc.

I took him up on one of these specials at the end of 2008. We had some scheduling issues and instead of Eric coming to my location, I went to his location at the end of December 2008. During the planning of the trip, all using his public email address, we had no communication issues what-so-ever (this would later change).

We spent the day together and planned out a membership site, tweaked an existing sales letter I had for an existing product, and recorded the video for the DVD. We also recorded a video testimonial from me about how much we’d accomplished that day. I had assumed the testimonial he wanted would be at the end of the year after he had helped me improve my business – so I was a little surprised when, at the end of the day, he want to record a testimonial.

When I returned home, I realized he had never given me the email address for his coaching program. I had to ask him for it.
That’s when things started to go south. I had problems with the video from the start. My video camera had jammed so we used Eric’s video camera for the interview. I happened to have a small external hard drive with me and left it with Eric for him to copy the video to and ship to me. It took a while but it finally arrived, at which point I proceeded to drop the box the drive was in (geez). When I connected it, it didn’t work. I emailed Eric to have him copy the file to something else and he no longer had it. His email responses started taking longer and longer. He could not locate the file. A couple of months went by. I took the drive out one more time to try it and got it working – and was able to copy off the video. I proceeded to work on editing it and creating a DVD.

With most email coaching programs like this, it’s common to ask the coach one question a day and get an answer back the same day or the next day, at most a couple of days. Most of my emails to Eric went unanswered – what I mean here is completely ignored, no responses at all. The few that were answered took weeks and some took 3 months – without any mention of the lapse of time. It’s like he just woke up one day and answered a 3 month old email. I would get fed up and send him a scathing email saying how frustrated I was with his help and how disappointed I was in him and would summarize the questions I’d sent him that he never answered. A couple of times, in response to these hostile emails, he would forward me a month (or more) old email to me that I never received asking me if I ever received it (“did you not see this” he would ask). I have all his email addresses and domains in my spam white list, so I know he never really sent these “missing” emails.

Back to the DVD: for some reason I had a lot of problems editing the video from Eric’s camera – the video and audio out of sync – like a Japanese monster movie. After a ton of work I got it fixed up and created a really nice DVD.

The time had come to make the sales letter. I had figured Eric would help with this, but that was not to be. After several emails he sent me a long copywriting preparation worksheet – which I really like by the way – to fill out and then create the copy from. There were also flash videos of him talking about the worksheet and a sales letter template he had made (which he said was just for me but later he made public on his blog). So I created the sales web site and got it launched.

All along I was looking forward to Eric promoting the DVD to his huge email list. He had said he would mail his list about it. I had been a subscriber to Eric’s email list for years and never saw any email from him promoting the DVD. I thought this was strange. I emailed him a few times about it with no response from him. So I went to his blog and I noticed he’d had a few blog posts that I didn’t get email about either… one of which was about my DVD… but looking in my stats, I had no traffic to speak of from his blog. So I filled out the form to sign up for his email list and instead of it saying I was already subscribed, it let me sign up… seems I’d been removed… strange. I emailed a blogging buddy of mine who I knew was also on his email list and he said yes, Eric did send an email about the latest blog posts, include the one about my DVD… that included a link to my sales page… but where was the traffic??? I could understand if people showed up and didn’t buy, but I only saw 5 to 10 visitors from his blog and no bump in traffic what-so-ever around the date of his mailing about my DVD. My conclusion – he either has a very small email list, or it’s very stale.

Over the course of the year, I slowly stopped trying to get help from Eric. I’ve sent a few emails telling him how frustrated and disappointed I was. Also over the course of the year, he has made several more videos advertising the same or similar packages, one or two using my video testimonial. I’ve asked him to stop using it.

He was supposed to help me get other “big names” in the business to agree to do more of these interview DVDs for the Masters of Online Income site (which was supposed to be a membership site). During the visit he gave me a list of web sites and names. That was his help in opening doors for me. I actually did email every one of these names (that I could find contact info for) telling them that I was working with Eric he had given me their name and that I wanted to interview them. It’s pretty easy to count the number of positive responses I had – 0. I assumed, as you probably would, that he would pick the phone up and call one or two while I was there and we’d get something setup and started. Our original plan was for this to be a membership site with me doing one of these video interviews a month.

It’s embarrassing to admit to the world that I was taken by Eric. He’ll probably say I didn’t follow his plan to the letter and that’s why I was dissatisfied. But the facts stand that over the course of a year he responded to and answered only a small handful of emails and never followed through on the other items on the list of things in the package.

I’ve also exchanged emails with two other people who have had the same experiences and I’ve heard from a top Internet Marketing Coach who says he’s heard the same complaints from several of his clients about Eric.

My point here is not to bad mouth Eric but to present the facts. I do actually think he knows how to improve conversion and that when he says things like “make links blue and underlined” he’s right. But I want to warn people NOT to purchase one of his package deals or other consulting services. He’s running one now titled: “How to Make 2010 Your Best Year Ever!” for $1997. My advice – DON’T DO IT!
He’s also raising the price on his Web Site Evaluations.com, “due to extreme demand” by $1000 on 1/4/2010. That makes the price almost $3000. Again, he does not take credit cards for anything over $1000 so you have to wire the money, use an online check, or overnight a check. My advice – DON’T DO IT!

Here are a few links to others who have been taken as well:
http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/graham-advantage-c200917/page/1.html
http://emarketworks.com/category/eric-graham/ (link no longer works)
http://www.elanelan.com/EricGraham.htm (link no longer works.  This one contained screen shots from the video promoting the same package I signed up for)

You may be wondering why I’ve not pressed Eric for a refund. First, read the posts at the 3 links above. Eric does not take credit cards for these big packages, only checks or wire transfers for items over $1000. Geez, I wonder why!

But, I didn’t pay Eric with money; we traded something of equal value to the cost of the package. I have asked for it back, or the cash equivalent, but, like the complaints in the links above, he has never respond to those emails. Actually he responded to one with the copywriting worksheet and videos mentioned above, contained in a forwarded month(s) old email he says he sent but that I must have never received… with no mention of my refund request or returning my property.

So that’s today’s lesson. There are good guys you can trust, and I’ll keep them in my blog roll. But there are a few rotten apples that will spoil your day. Do your homework before spending a large sum of money with anyone – use a search engine, type in their name and add the word scam, rip off, etc. – you might be surprised what you find.

You can thank me later!
Oh… please Digg, Stumble, etc. this post so that as many as possible will see it…
Until next time,
Fred

Update: Ryan Healy posted a blog post titled Internet Marketing on Life Support – he referenced my issues with Eric and also two other problems in the Internet Marketing field. Eric responded to his post with some pretty farfetched lies about me and what happened between us… and tried to make this sound like it was my fault! Eric has had a huge response to his post.

Update: In 2012 Eric was finally cornered by the Attorney General of Missouri and he is repaying some of the people he ripped off: Read the Press Release here: AG_reaches_settlement_with_business_Graham . A thank you to the excellent tenacity and persistence of the assistant D.A. in keeping the pressure on a very slippery Mr. Graham.

Update: 11/2014 – while tracking down broken links on this blog I found this complete post had been deleted… very ODD indeed – I either mistakenly did that or… is it possible I was hacked and only this post deleted?  Seems strange indeed.  Anyway, it’s back!

 

Comments: (Since I’ve removed all comments from this blog, I’m copying in the valid comments to this post below this update).

Joseph Alvini says:
December 31, 2009 at 11:52 pm
Wow I just saw this on sphinn. Thanks for the insight, it is unfortunate that their are still so many big name snake oil sellers out there. I am really hoping one day the SEO industry can weed all of these scammers out.

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David says:
January 1, 2010 at 2:20 am
Fred – Happy New Year. Eric sounds like another “JB” if you know what I mean. It is just a matter of time b4 his reputation catches up with him.
I don’t even read those launches that come in my email anymore. I just stick to one thing that I know works and go with that.
But I just wondered why you went the route of setting up a membership site with a new video interview every month. Would people actually listen to those videos?
It seems to be that with all you have accomplished with this blog – including being #1 or maybe #2 for the term “internet business” – you are your own success story.
Document what you have done – I would much rather read that than listen to “gurus”

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David Hartley says:
January 1, 2010 at 2:40 pm
Thank you for posting this, Fred.
The http://www.elanelan.com/EricGraham.htm link given in the post is ours.
Yes, unfortunately this post was not in time for us, as we paid Eric Graham $4,997 for consulting services in August 2009, but have not received either the services or a refund, despite numerous written requests for our money to be returned.
I have updated our http://www.elanelan.com/EricGraham.htm page today with a link back to this blog.
Hopefully 2010 will see Mr. Graham stopped, before he rips off too many more people.

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Mike says:
January 1, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Eric Graham is a bad guy, no doubt. This guy is really a snake because in his videos, he cleverly has photos of his two daughters on his computer in the background. This gives you the impression he’s such a good guy. Loving father, honest, blah, blah, blah.
Well, let me tell you what he’s really all about. I am one of the many that got burned by his ZeroTo500.com site. It was a 12 week coaching program that ended after just 2 weeks. After just 2 weeks, he stopped posting videos and the site has been dead ever since. He never answered emails about complaints or refunds, and he just ditched his paid subscribers.
He should be in jail – he’s a crook IMO. What else would you call someone who does this?
If enough people file online complaints with the Missouri Attorney General’s office (do a Google search), they might shut him down.
Graham’s business is located in Kansas City, Missouri, so you would want to complain to the Missouri Attorney General’s office.

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Richard Lee says:
January 1, 2010 at 5:47 pm
Hey Fred,
I read your post with great interest. The message was all too familiar and here’s why…
For $997 I purchased a multi-part Webinar series from Eric Graham called Website Flipping Mastery System Coaching program. The domain (now on a suspended account but still registered to Eric) is websiteflippingmastery.com
I still have the emails and I bought it on November 16th, 2007
The live Webinars were supposed to be delivered every other week ending in January 2008.
The first 2 modules were delivered on time but module #3 didn’t come out until January 2nd and part 1 of module 4 didn’t come out until April, 11!
And that where it stopped. Part 1 of module 4.
I honestly don’t remember how many modules there were but it was a whole lot more than 4!
Keep in mind this was supposed to have been completed in January of 2008 and as of April 2008, we weren’t even half way done.
In case you haven’t looked at your calendar lately, it should have been completed 2 years ago!
It is important to note that during that time frame Eric stated that Kansas City was having severe winter weather and he lost his Internet connection multiple times and he had a family member with a medical emergency once as well.
I sent Eric multiple emails politely asking about when the modules would resume and always got back polite excuses why they would be delayed further until such time as I no longer even received any type of reply to my inquiry.
I wish Eric and his family well but he owes me $997 and I’m happy to tell anyone who asks.
-Richard Lee
P.S. Fred, don’t feel bad about this for 1 second as all of us have been swindled. I’ve been burned several times and once even by someone who I was promoting just as you were with your DVD. It is a testament to your sense of fair play and natural good nature that you waited so long to post this giving Eric more than enough time to resolve the issue if he had cared.
Take care Fred.

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Tom Brownsword says:
January 3, 2010 at 2:09 am
Hello Fred,
I think that this post was very well written. Your post can save a lot of people from a great deal of heartache.
And like David (second comment), “JB” immediately came to mind when I read your post. Having been taken by the back-stabbing, oxygen stealing “JB” in the past, I appreciate your calm, detailed account of your experience with Mr. Graham. I most certainly will be wary of any dealings I have with him.
It looks like he has simply overcommitted himself, but even if that is the case, we have no business getting ourselves into a position like that where we accept money for things we can’t deliver.
I have a small “coaching” site, but payment is by the month, not the year, and subscriptions are via PayPal, which means that the purchaser can cancel at any time. Content delivery is also done via a website, not email (which is notoriously unreliable). I also don’t advertise it at all; the only time I bring it up is when people ask me for help in my specialty (computer security). And I say “no” if I can’t handle the workload (or, to be more accurate, I simply don’t tell people about it if I don’t have time to help them).
Again, thanks for a well-written post that can save a lot of people a lot of trouble — and money.
Best regards (and best wishes for 2010),
Tom Brownsword

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Ev Land says:
January 5, 2010 at 5:13 pm
That was a brave and noble post.
I’m amazed that this still happens. It makes us all look bad to the general public. I’m proud to report that one of our consulting businesses online has helped over 10,000 people and not one conflict yet.
We do not charge anywhere near that kind of money!
Maybe we should partner up?

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Danny says:
January 6, 2010 at 5:28 pm
I stumbled onto this post yesterday but didn’t have time to post a proper comment.
I too paid $5,000 for one of Eric Grahams full day visits, plus an additional $1,200 to fly him to the UK.
While my experience was certainly not the nightmare you apparently went through, and although I find the whole thing about comparing him to “criminals, rapists and child molesters” in your blog post to be over the line and distasteful, I must admit I found Eric almost as hard to get email replies from as you did.
He has to be one of the hardest people to get in touch with via email I’ve ever encountered.
While I did eventually get replies to most of my email coaching questions, and the answers he did give were great, often it took longer than 2 weeks, and often I had to email him 2 or 3 times to get him to respond.
To be fair, each time I actually contacted his assistant to schedule a phone consultation with him we were able to set that up fairly easily. Although, you have to book calls with him 2 or 3 weeks in advance, so even when you are spending $6000+ like I did, you can’t just pick up the phone and call him whenever you want for the coaching calls.
I know that he has several layers of assistants screening his incoming calls and emails to protect his time, but I can absolutely relate to the frustration you went through in asking him questions via email. I’m not sure if you ever tried actually scheduling a call with him, but that’s the only way I was able to get any real “coaching” after our full day together.
But with the $5000 day he only offered 4 or 5 hours on the phone as bonuses, so once I used those up I was back to the slow email access.
Another thing is I’ve never met anybody who goes on as many holidays or vacations with his family. And while he is on holiday with his family, he doesn’t even take his computer, so his assistants can’t even get a hold of him.
While I went through similar frustrations with the email situation that you did, where our experiences working with Eric seem to have been very different is in the full day consultation.
I was not quite sure what to expect when he came over here to the UK, but it’s unfortunate you didn’t get anything out of your day with Eric, because as frustrating as he is to deal with via email, in person he blew me away.
Perhaps it was because he had to spend so much time traveling to see me, but rather than just the 8 hours he promised in his video he spent the entire day working with me. From 9 in the morning until after 9 pm that evening. And the strategies and plans he shared with me and created for me were far beyond what I expected.
It’s been six months since his visit, and although I’ve only been able to follow through with half of the plan he laid out, the results have already brought in an additional 80,000 GBP. So for me, even though he is a frustrating chap to get email answers from, I’m very pleased with the overall results.
I guess I bought his program primarily for the day with Eric, and the calls and email access were just a bonus, so perhaps my expectations were different.
What is strange is that the person I spent the day with and had my phone consultations with is absolutely nothing like the person you described in your blog post.
While I can certainly sympathize with the infuriating email problems you had with him, when you pay as much for a program as you and I did you expect the person to at least reply to your emails in a timely manner, I simply cannot imagine someone actually spending an entire day with Eric and then getting so angry and frustrated that he writes a blog post about him that begins by talking about “criminals, rapists and child molesters”.
But in light of the problems you had with your day with Eric, even though he certainly delivered me the results I paid for and more in terms of money earned, I’m now having second thought about letting him use my success with his program as a case study.
I agree with Tom.
Eric has probably overcommitted himself. But if that’s the case he needs to either stop offering services, or take a couple fewer vacations with his kids. Spending time with family is dandy, but not at the expense of response time and availability to paying clients.
Maybe I just got lucky and got him on a good day, or perhaps it was because I was seeking his help for an existing business and not to record a product during my time with him, but if he really has changed this much in the few months since I last spoke with him, it’s a real shame because other than being slow to answer emails he struck me as a stand up bloke and his help made a real difference in my business.

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Fred Black says:
January 6, 2010 at 9:25 pm
I’m prefacing my reply to Danny with this…
Open Web Proxy Server: I believe Danny’s comment may not be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (91.204.210.16) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe there is a good chance that this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 91.204.210.16″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.
————–
Danny;
Thank you for your long and detailed comment. I appreciate it… even though I disagree with you.
I never compared Eric to “Criminals, rapists, and child molesters”… I simply said that these types use our human nature against us, knowing we don’t want to admit to others what has happened to us. Con-men and scam artists do the same thing. You are free to draw whatever inferences you wish however.
I think that Eric is a good father and family oriented person. As I mentioned in the article, I had corresponded with him from time over the past few years and we have both left positive comments on each other’s blogs. I considered him a friend up until he basically ripped me off.
I also think he knows what he’s talking about with conversion, so I’m not surprised that he was able to help your business.
However, if you read the comments here, and the web pages that I linked to, you’ll see that he has evidently changed and has shown a repeated pattern of taking people’s money and not delivering what was promised, not communicating, and ignoring refund requests. If mine was an isolated incident it would be one thing, but it’s more the standard than the exception.
Many months ago, in one of my emails to Eric, I told him that I believed in accusing in private and apologizing in public… this of course went unanswered. This is another reason I’ve waited so long to post this.
Like you, Eric spent more than the 8 hours with me during our day together. I flew into his home town and a blizzard ensued! I mean it was 7 degrees Fahrenheit and snowing like crazy! His family had other plans so we worked all day and into the evening.
But that’s where the good part ends. The interview we recorded that I made into a DVD contained some good material. Good but not great. I sent it to several of my blogging buddies as well as big name internet marketers hoping to get a few to JV with me and promote it to their lists. One well known and well respected Internet Business coach told me he would not promote it because the material was dated and just “good”, not great. Another told me he would not promote it simply because it was Eric – it seems Eric had stiffed him on a product he purchased and refused to answer email and ignored his refund requests.
The material on the DVD is good and would help anyone starting out as well as serve as a good review for any experienced internet marketer. But I no longer felt good trying to sell it.
Also like you, in person I found Eric to be friendly and caring… that’s one reason why I tried for so long to give him the benefit of the doubt. Like you, thinking he was over extended, family obligations, etc. After a while it became obvious that it’s something else.
I’m not sure that I buy the “layers of assistants” screening his email and calls… when he wanted to communicate, as when we were setting up my trip, he answered several emails the same day.
I repeatedly ask for the other items in the package (phone calls, web meetings, etc) all ignored.
The video advertising the package I (we) bought had the following items:

An intense full day, 1 on 1 in person coaching session at MY location with Eric Graham.
The right to record and sell the recordings of the entire days events
1 pre-visit phone or gotomeeting consultation
1 Year email Coaching
4 post-visit phone or gotomeeting consultations
and so much more….
I thought I had saved some screen caps of the video, but I can’t seem to find them, but there were several other promises made too…
I think he knows exactly what he’s doing. I’ve already had two people ask me about forming a class action law suit against him. I don’t want to do that. I made this post to alert others and hopefully stop anyone else from getting taken. I’ve already heard from one person who was about to take him up on his current offer and was VERY thankful she read my post first!

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Leoline says:
January 7, 2010 at 5:23 am
Good post. These days we come across so many of such kind. Although everybody is aware of the scams, they end up falling for it. I had got an email from the Sheraton hotel, saying i was recruited, and that was the offer letter. However, i got back to realize that i had never attended an interview with them. Since then I have been very careful. Thanks for sharing this post with us.

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Cindi says:
January 8, 2010 at 10:49 am
Well..I read the entire post and every comment because I believe the comments contain very beneficial information, this one was no exception.
I’m from the other side of this type of scenario and I want to thank you for confirming how important my responsibilities are in my position, that being the “client support” end of a business.
I would also be interested in knowing if anyone has forwarded this post to Eric. Would like to read what he would say.
Cindi

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Fred Black says:
January 8, 2010 at 11:35 am
Cindi;
Eric has probably read this post. I’m sure he get’s Google Alerts on his name, etc. I was very careful in what I wrote – there’ not one thing he can deny or say didn’t happen the way I said it did. So any reply he made would be useless – what could he possibly say? If he didn’t reply to me (or any of the others) in private why would you think he would reply in public?
This is not a case of bad customer service… or being too busy… It’s much more than that…

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Jonathan says:
January 9, 2010 at 2:22 am
I wonder why there’s no contrary view here…
Eric Graham has provided me with immense value over and extended period…
On behalf of my employer, I’ve just laid down some big money for a formal review of a financial services website.
At this stage I personally have no reason to question Mr Graham’s ethics and I look forward to a professional report with many usable tip to improve sales conversion.
Perhaps his fault is to bite off more than he can chew???
Jonathan
P.S. My personal home page at http://thebrainteacher.com/ features many MANY improvements as a result of Eric’s free blog and conversion videos. I have high expectations!

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Fred Black says:
January 9, 2010 at 9:38 am
Jonathan;
I wish you the best… I hope you read all the information on the pages I’ve linked to in this post… and the comments people have left… I hope your employer is understanding about their “big money”… and does not make YOU repay it. If you’ve read all the information here, it was pretty irresponsible of you to recommend them spending it that way.
So far it sounds like you’ve benefited from Eric’s FREE information on his blog… I have too. You’re being extremely naive. This is not a case of him “biting off more than he can chew”… look at how many complaints there are. It’s what the police call a “Modus Operandi“.

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Jennifer Harris says:
January 10, 2010 at 5:41 pm
Fred,
I’ve got to agree with both Jonathan and Danny.
Over the past couple years I’ve profited immensely from Eric’s advice and help.
And not just from his free advice like you claim Fred, but from hiring him as well.
Danny says that his consultation with Eric resulted in over $80k.
While I have not been that successful yet, I went through the exact same Zero to 500 program that is mentioned in a couple of your links above and it absolutely changed my life.
I had struggled with online marketing for years and never was able to make any progress in getting my own products to sell or make any money even as an affiliate selling other peoples products.
After going through his program, which was crazy cheap compared to most of his stuff, I think I paid under $500, but after going thru it and doing the homework I’ve created 4 different products and have 3 others I’m working on.
When I had trouble getting 1 of them to sell, I hired Eric to do a website critique, which was very expensive, like $2,000!
But it was amazing. He spent over 3 hours in the videos going line by line through my copy and after I made the changes and ran the test he recommended the sales at that site went from about $750 a month to over $3000 a month.
Between the products he helped me create with the info in Zero to 500 and the website evaluation he gave me I’ve been able to quit my job, become a work at home mom, stay home with my son and go full time online.
So you can say whatever you want about Eric Graham, compare him to “child molesters and rapists” all day long, but nothing you say or link to can convince me that he is anything but what he has proven to me that he is, and that is 100% genuine.
But you actually have to take action on what he recommends for it to work for you. I think that was the problem with a couple of the people who complained about his zero to 500 program.
At the end of each of the 12 modules, he gave us homework. We actually had to take action and follow through each week with the assignments he gave.
I remember a couple people complaining about all the work on one or two of the group coaching webinars he did, but I for one actually took action and did every single homework assignment and at the end of the program I had already made back the $500 I spent just from affiliate commission I earned testing a couple markets using his methods.
And even better than that, at the end of the 12 weeks I had created my first product, wrote my first salesletter, created a blog, built both free and paid traffic, and had over 500 people on my mailing list.
And anybody else who bought the program and actually did all the homework assignments would have done the exact same thing. If you didn’t have a product, blog, salesletter, and traffic at the end of the 12 weeks it’s only because you didn’t do the homework.
From what I could tell on the coaching webinars and based on what I saw in the members area, Eric probably sold several hundred memberships to that program. So if it sucked as bad as the one or two links you gave claimed why is there not far more complaints?
I can find complaints about just about any company in existence doing a decent volume of business.
Tony Robbins has complaints, so do other marketers like Russell Brunson and Matt Bacak.
But wait, I’ll bet you’ll say that since they are friends and clients of Eric’s that they must be scam artists too. But I’ve bought stuff from them too that helped me. But it helped me because I actually used it and took action on it.
You say that Eric helped you plan a membership site during your day with him, but I’ve check all the links on your blog and I don’t see it.
Where is your membership site? If you didn’t take action on the plan he gave you, where do you get off calling him a criminal?
Just because he was slow answering his emails?
With my website evaluation I got several weeks of email coaching with him, and although his answers were not instant, he did answer each and every one of my emails, and his answers were not just short 2 or 3 sentence replies. For a couple of them he recorded entire videos for me. One of the videos he’s recorded was over 30 minutes in length! All from a 10 word question I sent him.
And even though it took a week or two to set up, he was just as helpful during the phone consultation as he had been in the email coaching and evaluation video.
It is too bad you had the experience you claim you did while working with Eric. If it was really as bad as you say, I’m sorry. But my experience in working with him is 100% opposite. From what I’ve found when working with him is that you get out of it what you put into it.
If you expect him to do everything for you or give you some magic pill that will let you wake up rich and happy, you’ll probably end up disappointed or feeling like a “victim” like you seem to feel.
Personally, as a woman I refuse to allow anyone to make me feel like a “victim”, and I think allowing yourself to think that way is a sure sign of someone who prefers not to take responsibility for his or her lot in life.
We have plenty of people in government right now who are trying to make all of us feel like “victims” so they can take control of every area of our life. Maybe it because I’m from Texas, but I prefer to take responsibility for my own lot in life, and refuse to be made a victim by anyone.
But if you actually follow through on his advice and take action on the plan he gives you, like Danny did, and I did, then working with Eric Graham can change your life.
I’m proud to have had the chance to work with Eric and if he ever offers his full day coaching again I’m going to take him up on it.
You can disagree with me like you did Danny, call me stupid or naive all you want, or even call me irresponsible like you did Johnathan, but at the end of the day what you say simply doesn’t matter to me because I know the truth from my own experience and from my own bank account.
I don’t expect any of this to change your mind, but I figured people at least deserve to see differing opinion about Eric Graham to balance out what happens when you actually take action on his advice.
Jennifer Harris
—————————-
NOTE from Fred: I do not believe this comment to be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (216.245.202.34) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 216.245.202.34″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.

Reply
Fred Black says:
January 10, 2010 at 6:25 pm
Jennifer;
Thank you for leaving a comment. I don’t really appreciate your condescending attitude, but I approved your comment anyway. In fact, I wonder if you’re really Eric since you didn’t leave a URL and your comment really promotes his products and services, and takes a few shots at me… well anyway…
I made this post to help protect others. I’ve given Eric a full year to prove that he’s legitimate. He’s failed. He’s failed others too, not just me. Don’t take shots at me for HIS actions, or rather, HIS LACK of action and HIS LACK of ETHICS.
I don’t think you really read what I wrote or what the people I’ve linked to wrote. It’s NOT a matter of NOT following his instructions and advice. It’s a matter of Eric not delivering either a product or service that was purchased or not refunding money that was requested.
It’s funny that Eric’s so vocal about offering bullet proof guarantees and even offering double money back. But when it actually comes to refunding someone’s money he disappears like a ghost.
If you read what I wrote you should understand exactly what the problems were. It’s not a matter of me not taking action; there was never much of anything in his advice to take action on. Of the FEW emails he answered, some did contain things to take action on… and I did. But, as I said in the article, and as others have said too, most of the emails to his coaching program were never answered at all. I could tolerate slow, even a week to answer them, but they were just never answered.
I never expected Eric to do everything as you state, just what he promised to do.
And to answer your question about the membership program, it was to be the Masters of Online Income series… the interview with Eric was to be the first DVD. If you read what I wrote above then you’d know part of what he promised to help me with was meeting and setting up interviews with other internet marketers… something which never happened, even after repeated requests. So I moved on to other things.
I’m glad YOU had a positive experience.

Reply
Jennifer Harris says:
January 10, 2010 at 6:57 pm
Fred,
Thanks for approving my comment. I never thought about the possibility of you not allowing my comment to see the light of day.
Glad you did.
I’m not sure what you thought was condescending or taking shots at you.
All I asked is where was your memberships site. I guess that’s a sore subject for you.
Most of my comments about not taking action were directed at those complaining about the zero to 500 program I bought.
From your blog post I didn’t know you were a member of that program, so if you wont through it and didn’t act on it, I’m sorry if I offended you.
Of course I’m not Eric, and the fact that you went there speaks volumes about you.
My comment was not intended to “promote Eric’s products”, in fact as far as I know Eric’s Zero to 500 program that I spoke highly of was a one time deal that he promoted as a favor to one of his coaching clients.
So how am I trying to promote something you can’t even buy?
Like I said earlier, I’m sorry your experience with Eric makes you think he’s “not legitimate”.
But I for one know different, and I’ll be forever grateful to him for what his advice and help has done for me and my family.
Jennifer
———————–
NOTE from Fred: I do not believe this comment to be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (216.245.202.34) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 216.245.202.34″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.

Reply
Jenny says:
January 10, 2010 at 7:24 pm
And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry if you thought my attitude was condescending.
But I find it offensive that you respond to anybody (Jonathan, Danny, me) that posts something positive, by calling them “irresponsible”, “extremely naive” and other things.
Or by accusing them of not being themselves.
And as a victim of rape and molestation as a child I was deeply offended by the way you began your post.
I guess when I saw you comparing someone who has been such a blessing in my life to the type of people who hurt me so severely, it kind of pushed the wrong buttons with me.
So I’m sorry for that.
But even with actual rape and molestation, I was still strong enough to not allow myself to put the weak and pathetic label of “victim” onto myself.
One of my favorite quotes, and one that helped me through some dark times during my early teen years is, “If it’s never our fault, we can’t take responsibility for it. If we can’t take responsibility for it, we’ll always be a victim.”
Jenn
—————
NOTE from Fred: I do not believe this comment to be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (216.245.202.34) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 216.245.202.34″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.

Reply
Fred Black says:
January 10, 2010 at 8:27 pm
Jennifer;
It’s my blog… if I think someone is naive or irresponsible, I can say so. That’s what blogs are for. I stand by what I said 100%
I hate you’ve experienced bad things. No one should have to.
As I’ve said, I made this post to warn others. I’ve had emails over the past year from others with similar experiences as mine. It was time someone stepped up and made a post about this and tried to stop others from being victimized.
I’ve never been part of the Zero to 500 program. I’m aware that he promoted it for one of his coaching clients. He never delivered or finished the program, leaving HER clients hung out to dry, and ignoring THEIR refund requests. She is no longer his coaching client – her experiences parallel mine. How do you think SHE feels? She and I have exchanged emails over the past months. I have emails from her saying how at first Eric was great, and then time after time he failed to deliver what was purchased, keeping money that should be refunded, not answering emails, etc., then finally duping the people on HER email list. Maybe she will respond if she reads this.
I’ve been around for years, long enough to have seen blogging and Internet Business people attack each other and good people get hurt – so my statement about you possibly being Eric comes from experience… it’s happened before.
I’m only blaming Eric for the things that are his fault; I’ve not said anything else was his fault. I’m not playing the victim here as you keep inferring. In fact, I AM taking RESPONSIBILITY by warning others. I’m not ASKING for anything, only presenting the information so others can be warned.
People change and from my experiences, and from other people’s experiences, it appears that over the past couple of years Eric has changed. I’m glad he helped you, but that does not excuse or make right the wrongs he’s committed to others. Nor does it mean that I should not try to warn others.
At this point, let’s just agree to disagree…

Reply
Ricky says:
January 12, 2010 at 5:19 pm
Fred – Happy New Year. really a great post.
I just wondered why you choose to set up a membership site with a new video interview every month. Does it helps in any ways?
Also if you don’t mind can you tell the what you steps you used to rank your blog high on searches – I would like to read as i am also looking to promote my site. (note: Ricky – I removed your link because it didn’t work)

Reply
Fred Black says:
January 12, 2010 at 9:03 pm
Ricky;
You can find out how I rank high from reading the SEO posts I’ve made on this blog (select the “Search Engines: SEO” category in the top left column) and from my course Search Engine Optimization Secrets Revealed.

Reply
Cozmo says:
January 13, 2010 at 1:06 am
For some reason the inner circle club of SEO experts peddling extremely expensive info products and services to poor webmasters has always sickened me. They all seem to work with each other to spit out a new product every week and try to get everyone to buy it. I eventually just left all those mailing lists and haven’t looked back. I’m not surprised that there are probably several bad apples in the barrel.

Reply
Cathi Adams says:
January 13, 2010 at 9:46 am
Anyone that knows me would tell you I never say a bad thing about anyone. I can find the good in everyone… and I do. My intention is not to bad mouth Eric but to share the experience I had with him the good and the not so good. In the end, you will make your own opinion.
At one time Eric was definitely a solid ethical business man. I have endorsed him in the past. Unfortunately, I cannot do so any longer. I have tried my best to be as understanding as possible with him, but he crossed the line ethically and I can’t explain away his behavior any longer.
I paid him a fee monthly for his coaching program years back. I did so for 3 or 4 years. He was awesome! Very responsive – he went above and beyond consistently!! He was the BEST!! A true gem!
Then, slowly, things changed… He never finished a site I paid him for and he ignored my requests for refunds. He took the summer off but didn’t tell me or stop charging me for my monthly fee. During that time I would book consultations with him that his assistant setup (with his permission) and I would get his voice mail when I called in for the scheduled appt. He never called to apologize for the missed session or acknowledge that a session was missed.
I continued to be billed (and I did not object) my monthly fee without any phone consultations with him for 6 months (Dec – June ’08) because he was so dependable in the past I thought he was just in a rough patch… I wanted to be understanding. I take full responsibility for my actions – I shouldn’t have continued to let him bill me, but I did. My fault – not his. His assistant said he had been ill and I thought it was just taking him a while to get back on his feet.
At no time did his assistant tell me he was taking “the summer” off. Obviously, she didn’t know either because she kept booking the appointments. The way I learned of his “taking the summer off” was when he sent out a video for his in-person coaching program…in that video he said he had taken the summer off. Excuses he or his assistant would email me for missed appts from Dec to June were… he took a month off to vacation with his family (I was never informed of this and a refund was not given for that month)… he was in the hospital (didn’t even ask for a refund for that one- – gave him the benefit of the doubt)…He took the summer off to spend with his family as he stated in his video- well after the summer ended. From reading his blog it seemed he was busy traveling to speaking engagements. Seemed his business was taking off. I was happy for him. On the other hand…
If you own an internet business that charges a monthly fee you are ethically obligated to, at the least, inform your paying clients of your plans and either stop monthly charging for that time or work out an agreeable solution. (I’m very understanding – I would have been happy to work something out with him) The fact that someone said in an earlier post that he doesn’t even take his laptop when he is away with his family is just another “Eric” excuse and poor business practice considering his business model of offering monthly billed coaching sessions.
Anyway, since I am a person who still believes the best in all people and everyone is worth a second (third and forth) chance… I took Eric up on his full day coaching offer. Since I had been doing business with him for years, I thought if I saw him in person, we could discuss the past issues and then, kind of, wipe the slate clean and start fresh. It was a pleasure meeting him and I had a fantastic day with him. He was extremely professional and did deliver 150% on the one-on-one coaching portion of his promise. I thought things were getting back to normal again with him I was thrilled.
Again, I signed up for his coaching program. Unfortunately, my dad took ill and I had to back out after 3 months because caring for my father became a full time job and finances became tight. (My father passed the following month.)
The last straw was the Zero to 500 program. He made it sound like he was going to offer this program to my list to help me out while my dad was ill. It was not true because I received emails from other marketers who were offering Eric’s program as well. I let that go… business is business, but then he only delivered two weeks of the 12 week program he promised my list. I’d be interested to know of others who did NOT get more then two weeks of the program. I emailed Eric to let him know that multiple people were complaining to me that they paid for the program and it hadn’t been updated in weeks. I asked him to please honor his commitment. Eric responded:
As for the Zero to 500 program, we are trying to figure out what is going on. A handful of people (mainly ones who ordered with the discount link) seem to be stuck at week 2 in the content.
Right now they should have access to over 25 different training videos, but for some reason we are having to go in by hand and delete their membership, then re-create it with full access.
Its been a real nightmare. But hopefully we are getting down to the last of the locked-up memberships.
The good news is the people who CAN access the content are absolutely thrilled with what they have got so far.
=======
My issues with his explaination above are these… If my membership was “locked” I would not have been able to access the content. I WAS able to access the content… there just wasn’t any content beyond week two.
If there was a problem with multiple memberships, he should have sent out an email explaining that to the people that signed up and told them to contact him to get the issue resolved. I believe that people are very understanding. We all understand that “stuff happens”. Not returning anyone’s emails or requests for support suggests to me he had no intention of following through on his commitment.
I don’t know of ANYONE who signed up for that offer at that time (he may have since completed the course) that received more than the two weeks of the 12 week program. People were emailing me because Eric had not responded to their multiple requests for support or requests for refunds and I was the one that endorsed him to them. Messing with me is one thing, but when you mess with my customers I have to draw the line. That’s just wrong.
So, if asked, would I recommend Eric’s services? Unfortunately, no, not with a good conscience.
He is not reliable when paid in advance and you will never get your money back if he decides not to deliver on something he has promised. It’s hit or miss with him. Maybe if he sees these posts he will realize he is very talented and doesn’t need to steal people’s money. He can easily make good honest money if he does the right thing by his clients. Hopefully, he will see the light. I miss the Eric I once knew. I hope he will change back. He is in my prayers.

Reply
Dan Pratt says:
January 13, 2010 at 10:27 am
I wanted to post an update what I wrote last week.
Although I had not emailed Eric with any coaching questions in over a month, since I do still have a couple months left on my 12 months of access I decided to give it a go and see if I could get his input on an offline sales letter I’m sending out here in Manchester.
And based on the doubts I began to have about him due to reading your blog post, I also wanted to see for myself if he had really changed as much as you claim he had since I met him in person.
I emailed the letter to him on Monday at 4:56 PM GMT, and I received his reply Tuesday at 3:16 PM GMT. That is less than a 24 hour turnaround time.
And like many of his other replies to my questions, rather than just sending a short one or two sentence answer, he took the time to record me a 39 minute screen capture video explaining the changes he recommended, and the reasons behind his recommendations.
Additionally, rather than just telling me what to change, he made the edits and rewrites directly to the Word document I sent him, and then attached the updated file to the email with the video link.
I did interpret your “rapists and child molesters” remarks to be intended to paint Eric into that same crowd. And based on some of the other comments I was not alone in finding them distasteful.
Con men and scam artists simply take people’s money and run, delivering no value. But you yourself admit Eric apparently spend the entire day with you as he did me, so while I agree his lack of email support to you is disappointing, it certainly doesn’t put him in the same league as “criminals, rapists, child molesters”, nor does it make him a “conman” or “scam artist”.
Another point I want to clear up is, another poster mentioned that my day with Eric improved my sales by “$80,000″, but that is not correct. If you read my post carefully you’ll see that I said 80,000 GBP. With the current exchange rate, that is around $130,000 USD.
I am embarrassed to say that I allowed this blog post, from someone I’ve never even heard of before, to temporarily poison my attitude about someone I’ve personally met, worked with and who has benefited me and my business immensely.
Danny Pratt

Reply
Fred Black says:
January 13, 2010 at 11:26 pm
I’m prefacing my reply to Danny with this…
Open Web Proxy Server: I believe Danny’s comment may not be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (91.204.210.16) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe there is a good chance that this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 91.204.210.16″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.
———-
Danny;
Thank you for your comment too. Because you posted with an open free web proxy server I had originally thought you may not be real and had noted so at the end of your comments. You have since emailed me privately telling me you’re real… (I’ll leave out the other things you said about me!). For those that do not know what a open web proxy server is see below.
I have also updated my comment policy to include that I will probably delete any comment I find that’s posted from an open free web proxy – I don’t know why anyone would need to hide behind an anonymizing proxy when posting to my blog.
I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you’re being honest (and are not Eric).
I’m glad Eric has helped you and continues to answer your emails. I wish he would do the same for the rest of the people who have paid him money to do so. Or give them their money back.
I could not disagree with you more on the definition of conman and scam artist. Taking someone’s money and not delivering what was agreed upon, and doing so on a REGULAR basis, certainly fits the definition of those words… it also fits the definition of criminal and thief. Someone can get over booked, over committed, etc. and let a few things drop, but any person with any MORAL FORTITUDE to speak of, would COMMUNICATE that to the people who have paid them money upfront expecting goods and services. And they would RESPOND when asked what’s going on. And they would REFUND money when asked – especially when their guarantee says they WILL DO SO.
It’s not just email coaching that he failed me on, there were several items in the package and the ONLY one he delivered on was the onsite visit. So it was not just a matter of slow or non-existent answers. Like Cathi, I tried being nice when he didn’t answer my emails or respond to questions about the other items in the package.
Maybe Eric’s not a bad guy, but several of us have given him EVERY opportunity, over a LONG period of time, to fix the problems and resolve the issues. But HE has chosen not to. I AGREE that he can be helpful, but his EXTREME inconsistency does no one any good, and in fact causes a lot of damage.
The thing is, even if Eric has helped YOU and YOUR business, it does not excuse what he’s done to others.
—————
Open Web Proxy Server: I believe Danny’s comment may not be authentic. The IP address it was posted from (91.204.210.16) is a server known to be an open proxy. I believe there is a good chance that this comment was posted by Eric. However, in the event I’m wrong, I have approved it anyway so that you can make your own decision.
How to find out if a site is an Open Proxy
You can go to http://www.ip2proxy.com and enter the IP address and it will tell you if it’s an open proxy or not. If it shows no, then…
Go go Google and do a search like this (without quotes) “site:www.freeproxysite.com 91.204.210.16″
Or, you can just enter the ip address by itself in the Google search box to see what comes up.
Proxy sites are used to hide or mask the true source. This is from Wikipedia’s definition of an Open Web Proxy Server: An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals.

Reply
Rich says:
January 18, 2010 at 6:41 pm
I vividly recall that Eric Graham was a big fan of the “controversial” James Brausch that several have alluded to here. He mentioned going on a cruise with him, and he even snapped to attention and bashed “CD Baby” about the time James asked his list to do so in order to support his own ends.
People really are judged (and should be) by the company they keep.
The fact that some people are coming out of the woodwork to comment on this post using anonymous proxies says EVERYTHING.
There really aren’t that many credible internet marketers out there, but I consider you to be one of the few.

Reply
DDP says:
January 19, 2010 at 11:42 am
Unfortunately, I’ve had a similar negative experience with Eric Graham. I was suckered in by his marketing pitch and image. It’s a shame that there are people out there who take advantage of others like he does. Thanks for shedding some light on the situation!

Reply
Katy says:
January 23, 2010 at 5:35 pm
Fred,
There is little doubt. Your theory about the laudatory posts being written Eric Graham are most likely correct. The logic and language fits his style….
He appears to accept a modicum of responsibility for his failures to create credibility…
His post and sites and videos talk about (and offer photos) of FAMILY… He is a “millionaire” with expensive hobbies and toys.
On Ryan Healy’s website, Mr. Graham spins a yarn about how he agreed to accept a guitar in trade for his services. He claims he did it because he felt sorry for the customer (although he did sort of admit he recognized its value as a gift for his father.) Mr. Graham’s said (his love for his father and his compassion for the desperate potential customer) “caused my heart to win out over my head.” He then blames himself “100%”for being such a good guy and getting sucked in to swapping his services for a guitar.
Graham is an adult. His agreement to trade his services for a guitar was a real agreement…
A review of his Federal Income Tax Return would be interesting… Bartered transactions AND the value received are INCOME, and as such TAXABLE EVENTS. The IRS needs to review his return to see if he REPORTED THE INCOME.
The FBI could not nail Al Capone for his racketeering, murder, etc. They did nail him for evasion of Federal Income Taxes.
After he collects the money, everything is wrong with his customers… they are lazy, stupid, liars, crooks… and so on. Sometimes, he is just sick, or taking care of his loving family or swamped!
To be fair, Eric Graham appears to be one or two notches above Bernie Madoff, the classical scam artist. I do wonder who posted the non-existent stock purchases and records of “profits” for Bernie, but I digress.
Is Eric Graham slick? He sets up lots of things he did wrong (motivated by his compassion, love, being God fearing guy that he is and so on.)
I thought his ending of his blog post at Mr. Healy’s site was a nice touch. He ended with:
“so I’ve got some praying and soul searching to do to see what changes I need to make in the ways I attract and work with my clients.” and signed off “God bless, Eric.”
It appears that nearly one half of the people who have not received promised services from him have offered to “pray for” him.
Based on many complaints across the web, it looks like he spends more time justifying why he does not deliver than he does delivering.
Bernie Madoff was a wonderful salesman. If he had sold something of value, he could have greatly contributed to society. Instead, he used his intellect and persuasion to rip others off.

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Fred Black says:
January 23, 2010 at 6:21 pm
Katy;
Thank you for your comment…
Yes, that was what I traded Eric – a custom grafted-walnut Taylor guitar… a very, very nice guitar… I paid almost $5,000 for it a couple of years before I traded it to Eric… guitars like that do not loose value either, they only gain value. So he came out just fine. Better than I did for sure.
Eric’s comment on Ryan’s blog made it sound like I was destitute and borderline homeless… this was not the case. I was frustrated with several things, wanted to take my online business to the next level, and was short on cash. I also found it humorous how he brought cows, chickens, and pigs into the conversation.
I made him the offer because I thought HE played the guitar, he does not, but he had marketed some guitar products or something and that’s where I got that idea that he played.
What I found curious is that he agreed to the deal in exchange for a Christmas present for his dad… a millionaire, getting a used (but in mint condition) item for a parent for Christmas seems a little strange to me… still does…
I obviously don’t know what Eric reports and does not report on his taxes!

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Gregory E. Nemer says:
January 23, 2010 at 6:56 pm
Hi Fred,
I want to apologize for not responding to this article and backing you up sooner.
Actually I read Eric’s testimony on Ryan Healy’s blog. He is very good with words.
After leaving Ryan’s blog I felt the necessity to write my own post.
I never have wanted to use a blog for any negative comments but then again I felt that there is a crime in staying silent. Especially after Eric publicly responded to you (On a different blog).
Whats more, I felt compelled to speak out since I knew that I had also been taken for a small amount from Eric. I purchased his membership shortly after seeing your video interview with him. He failed to deliver and it was hard to cancel.
Of course, I don’t blame you for the purchase.I am responsible for my own actions.
We both agree that he has a real talent.
My only hope is that he can turn around and “market” his gifts in a more ethical manner.
I posted my shortcomings and testimony today-
http://www.reallifepurpose.com/pansy/
Again, could you please forgive me for not backing you up sooner.
You’re a man of integrity and I stand with you believing for our mutual success in the internet business world.

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British Columbia Business Plans says:
February 3, 2010 at 11:05 am
I am amazed that this still happens to general people, But thanks for your great post, I truly appreciate it, Keep it up and keep sharing your posts, Thanks.

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Jack says:
February 3, 2010 at 11:48 pm
O.k.
It took me about an hour to read through everything here and finally get to the place where I can also post a message.
Unfortunately I have the Exact SAME experience as Fred and Personally know 3 other people who had the same experience and dropped big dollars for Eric’s services.
I know Eric from several Internet Marketing Seminars and was for quite some time part of the same Coaching Group he was in (not as a coach but as a student).
I was the newby wanting to learn from him and anyone else around as much as I could.
I spent countless hours in the Bar together with him (although he doesn’t drink) asking him questions and picking his brain.
And his answers always seem to make sense, although it seemed to be almost impossible to have done as many different tests as he claimed to have done. But I was new and believed it.
I guesss I was just being lured into his web with the ultimate purpose of falling for one of his $5000 (or more) programs. And so I did.
I signed up for the 1 day in my office and actually had not much problems getting him to show up. I even let him sleep in my “guest Casita” and offered breakfast.
Then we worked on some stuff during the day but each time I actually wanted him to DO something for some reason he deviated and instead just explained the theory behind it.
He did however give me some GREAT tips on how to do a certain presentation which at the end resulted in about $400,000 in sales. So I can’t complain about that part.
But getting him to DO something during that day in my office was virtually impossible.
So as time went on over the following weeks time I grew more and more suspicious as I also did not get answers to my emails, did not get a hold of him (and I have his cell phone number) and could not get a hold of any “supposedly” existing Assistant.
So when it all blew up and posts like these were posted I finally voiced my concerns to others and what is the surprise.
Right away 3 out of 4 people I mentioned my concerns and experiences to, had similar problems. No answers, partly delivered programs, (Did I mention I also signed up in parallel for one of his 6 weeks programs and am still waiting for weeks 5 and 6 to be delivered, that is over 1 year later).
A friend of mine signed up for his Coaching of $2500 per month and could in 2 month get him to do not more than answer 2 emails (of dozens he sent). That is a little scarce for $2500 / month don’t you think? by that time he cancelled and Eric has not answered to any of my buddy’s money back requests.
another Person I know who had plans for some Partner Products together with him was left holding the bag and can’t ever get a hold of him anymore.
needless to say that even the coaching group Eric was part of kicked him out because of the exact same reasons.
False Promises
Product that were not fulfilled or only partially fulfilled.
Bottom line:
I now believe that none of the Big Products and Niche Products Eric always talked about he has and that make him 1/4 Million Dollars per month actually exist.
That was all lies to get people like me into his web.
I used to like him, but should have trusted my gutt which from the beginning told me to be careful. But the association with all the big names, the speaking on big stages, all that was soo much “social Proof” that I fell for it too.
I am lucky to say that I still have done very well in information marketing but I am taking this as a good warning for the future to ask for more actual PROOF of people having DONE something before I sign up for their services.
Jack

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Megan says:
April 19, 2010 at 9:46 am
First of all I have been away from your blog for a little while, I had some health problems. But I came back to the exact reason I have enjoyed reading from you.
There is no hold back information that benefits your readers. I can say thankfully I have no connection with Eric, and after reading this post never will.
Regardless of viewpoints and politics you get right to the point whether people like it or not. I love it… It is about your readers and helping them regardless of waves being made.
I am sure you are helping people not run into the same hardships you have. So glad to be back on your blog!
Keep it up.

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Chris says:
May 23, 2010 at 8:20 pm
I signed up for Eric’s coaching program and was not happy. His email coaching was okay to start with and then it took WEEKS to get response.
He did give me some really good consulting to start with but it just turned to crap after a while.
I stated to voice my concerns but had already been charged my 2nd month…
I did not get my money’s worth and even though I liked his blog I could not stand to subscribe because I felt he over sold and under delivered.

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Glen Hallock says:
June 11, 2010 at 9:18 am
Hey all. Let me start off by saying first and foremost, as a disclosure of sorts, that I have never done business with Eric.
We are first cousins on my mother’s side. My legal last name is Willcutt, but I go by Hallock because of a falling out on the Willcutt side, and I just haven’t gotten around to changing it.
I have known Eric all my life. Growing up, I idolized him because he always seemed to have everything together. And mainly because he was into aviation as much as I am.
The last time I ever saw him in person or spoke to him would be in 2000, when he took me up in his private plane for a joyride from the Mulino Airport in Oregon. Extremely fond memories.
Which is why I am finding all of this so hard to believe.
Realize, I just found out about all of these complaints and his business practices mere hours ago, so I am still kind of reeling. But I believe them to be 100% true. THAT many people can’t all be making it up.
In fact, just mere minutes ago I removed him from my Facebook contacts. And I plan on writing him a letter answering to all of these allegations. Why you ask?
Truth be told, I IDOLIZED the man. He was my hero growing up. And to find all of this out…..it really hurts. My other cousin Nicholas Hepler and Myself, being the same age, looked up to him as if he was God reincarnated on Earth.
I have yet to tell Nick about all of this, but I have a feeling he is going to be just as crushed.
Excuse the analogy, but it’s kind of like finding out that Mother Teresa was a prostitute on the weekends. Shocking and hurtful, to say the least. I always considered myself close to Eric, and a kindred spirit of sorts in terms of our mutual affinity with all things aviation. Hell, I still have the IFR charts he gave me at the hangar he used to rent at the Troutdale Airport in Oregon. And they are completely useless and outdated, but I viewed them almost as a bible because Eric gave them to me and they dealt with aviation.
I guess what I am getting at is, you don’t really know people, even close family.
I’m truly sorry for anyone that was taken by him, and only hope and pray that they are able to get closure, be it full refunds, or reparations of SOME kind, what have you.
You all think you have it bad? I was snowed by the guy for 29 years! (That is meant as a joke, as I know you all have it very bad considering Eric’s treatment of you.)
Again, I apologize. And I appreciate you letting me get this off my chest. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Glen Hallock

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Kenyaspeaks says:
June 14, 2010 at 10:41 am
It has been a few years, but I paid Eric $500 for his e-mail coaching program at the beginning of January in 2007. It was $500 a month where he would respond to one e-mail at a time. Like everyone, I paid and he only responded to one e-mail. It took me until the end of March to hear from him and he made it sound like he was doing me a favor to offer me 2 weeks of e-mail coaching.
I am a single Mom and thought he would be credible. I felt like I wasn’t worthy enough to be coached by him. But since then, I saw that he was still sending out his coaching programs and wondering why I was the only one who had been burned. But sadly, I see that others have gone through this, too.
It’s horrible!
Eric is a big scam artist and when I would see his posts about his kids and all of the fun things he was doing, and his videos of his office at his home, I get ticked off because he has done nothing to earn it….

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Gary & Viktoria Affron says:
July 2, 2010 at 4:36 am
Greetings Fred!
You’re right on track with Ethics 101. It’s something we avidly believe in and talk about with each and every person we invite to join any one business we’re involved with. There is no room for people in our business that are not truly honest and ethical …period!
We’ve learned over 29+ years in business both off and online that people involved in marketing come from all levels of education and culture. In our humble opinion, there are 7 kinds of marketers …
1) Those who are serious,
2) Those who talk about being serious,
3) Those who sit on top of action and do nothing,
4) Those who depend on others to do everything for them,
5) Those who will do most anything to succeed whether ethical and honest or not,
6) Those who join a business to be “social” with so called online “friends”,
7) Those who take action, continue to learn and DO succeed the RIGHT way with honesty, integrity and ethical business practices!
Folks, if you’re going to be involved in having your own business, invite people that have the same principles, values and character into your business. Take your time and really get to know someone. Research the company, corporate personalities and the people you come across online that are interested in your business.
Do your due diligence before becoming involved with a business and before you invite someone you don’t know to become involved in your business!
Don’t beg, plead or buy others way into your business, they wont appreciate it and ultimately will not work to build their own team beneath you.
Unlike days of old when people use to appreciate a “hand up” unexpected, these days they don’t unless it’s something they’ve chosen personally and they have to sacrifice, save and pay for it on their own!
Stick to your principles, honesty, ethics and values in how you manage your business. Don’t allow others to “barn-swaggle” you into other methods of managing your business or joining something you really have no interest in because they consider you to be a “friend” and if you don’t join them, you’re betraying them.
This is an often used “psychological tactic” that only results in loss of friendships that likely never were in the first place!
Oddly enough, alot of people using this type of “marketing tactic” as a means of controlling and manipulating others to do what they want them to and not necessarily what the other person wants to do. You can believe they’re out here in droves. Most are very experienced in the ways they know or have been taught to manipulate others.
You’ll recognize them because they seem to have an endless list of people they join together in any business they pursue and they have tons of people whose personal info they’ve collected by any means possible including the taking of other peoples lists and downline members info!
Be cautious of those that would attempt to convince you that the “only” way to succeed is to ride the “coat tails” of someone bigger in the industry or …join them because they’re beneath a “biggie” in the business. This only leads to expectations that almost never end up in anything but a wish and a prayer.
Find something that YOU want to do and never base that desire on the word of someone else no matter who they are! If you follow your heart and keep solidly to your goals and expectations …you’ll find the right thing to do, the right people to do it with and the right road to success in your life and in business!

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Uzi says:
July 21, 2010 at 12:05 am
That was a really bad experience. I am happy that I havn’t paid anyone yet for my websites. Thanks for sharing your eye opener experience.

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Jason Fladlien says:
July 28, 2010 at 2:37 am
Instead of working, I spent the last hour reading this fascinating post and the comments following. That comment near the end by Glenn…. I think that post in particular says a lot about the type of person Eric is. I almost hope I run into him someday.
Thanks for doing your part to expose this scam artist.