Pat Flynn - Is he a scam? Does he make what he claims?

[Arouet]

[ProfWag]

[Scepcop]

Logical Reasons why I don't think Pat Flynn really makes $30k a month

I got to thinking and realized some logical reasons why probably doesn't make $30k a month in as he claims on his blog. It's all very simple when you apply basic logic and common sense. Let me explain.

First, think about this. Suppose you were making $30,000 a month from online passive income. Would you do anything to jeopardize such a big cash cow? Of course not. But if you were to publicize it on a web page, as Pat Flynn did, you'd be doing just that. When you publicize how much money you are making, there are undoubtedly going to be a lot of envious people out there who will either try to emulate you, or sabotage your enterprise. Since you don't know who is out there, why would you take such a risk and expose yourself like that? Furthermore, if you were making it that big in online income, you'd have it made and have NOTHING TO GAIN in publicizing it or drawing too much attention to it.

In other words, if you were really making $30k a month, you'd have NOTHING to gain by publicizing it and A LOT TO LOSE!

But on the other hand, suppose you were making a lot less than $30k a month. In that case, you would have something to gain by exaggerating your income (which anyone can do) and claiming that you make $30k a month. By doing so, you attract attention to your site, which increases traffic hits, thus increasing your online revenue and affiliate commissions. And you also get a large group of followers and fans willing to do anything you say (which means they will buy any product or service you suggest). And whoila! Bingo!

So in that case, you would have A LOT TO GAIN and NOTHING to lose! See how that works? It's simple logic.

Second, I've noticed that whenever I email Pat Flynn, he usually replies within an HOUR! This happens whether I email him late at night or in the afternoon. What this seems to indicate, is that he is online all day and evening, trying to make money and answering emails. If that's so, then he is WORKING HARD - which means he is earning Active Income, rather than Passive Income. LOL

Now, if his income were truly passive, why would he need to be online all the time? That doesn't make sense. If he had a passive income of $30k a month, he would be in the Florida Keys or Cancun sipping a margarita by the poolside or beachside, and not be online much. Come on now. Get real. This appears to be a logical contradiction.

What do you think? Isn't that suspicious? Do these logical reasons make sense?

[ProfWag]

[Arouet]

He probably just has his blackberry with him all the time.

Scepcop: why so much focus on this guy? You know intuitively that the promise of easy money is a myth. You know what you need to do to have a successful site, you must be able to generate high volume of traffic. You need you site to be google optimized to generate hits, and you need a site that people will want to visit.

None of that is easy. It takes hard work.

Forget about this guy and his site - it's not worth it!

[Scepcop]

[Craig Browning]

Scepcop, I can kind of support your rationale; we call things "Miracles" because they aren't daily events and they can't be replicated; they are a rare and uncanny phenomena for the most part. But then we have those daily miracles such as child-birth, bringing folks back from the dead (think about it. . . ) and even those unbelievable moments when politicians admit to being wrong, but that's an entirely different sort of miracle

No, I'm not poking fun, the first part of my response is how I look at such things but not all things we so randomly tag the "M" word to. By my training alone, I cannot accept most of what people claim as being miraculous, be it due to Psi, ET, or Ghost Poop I simply must question it and look at it through the filtering processes I've been trained to employ first and foremost. This is why we butt heads on things and how I can say bluntly that someone like Sloan is a serious fake and similarly, first a flare gun up in warning when it comes to this other clown; fast money at the levels he's boasting is rarely legal/honest. He will be found out in time and unfortunately leave a wide wake of folks whose lives have been devastated as the result of their own greed and ignorance.

[Scepcop]

Arouet,
While you are right that making money online is hard work, the thing is, the internet marketing gurus will tell you that too, and so will Amway distributors.

In fact, anyone will tell you that it is hard work to make money in your own business (even the deceptive Amway and its MLM copycats will tell you that). But what they WON'T tell you is that the rate of growth is very slow, unless you are lucky enough to have outside forces helping you. Instead, these internet marketing gurus will paint a false picture - that when you start trying to earn money online, you work hard for one month and earn a few thousand dollars, and then it goes uphill from there. That's where they are deceiving you and painting a false picture of reality. But of course, they have a vested interest in retaining their followers and not letting them get them discouraged; that's why they exaggerate the rate of growth of online income, rather than tell you the brutal truth about it. Therefore, where these gurus deceive you is in their false portrayal of the rate of growth in this type of venture, even if they admit that "you have to work hard to make money online".

In actuality though, the picture is not that rosy. When you start out, you will be earning virtually NOTHING the first few months, and when you do, it will start as a slow trickle. First you might earn 20 dollars a month, followed by 30, then 40, and so on. That's the reality of how it usually works. It takes a lot of endurance to continue on at that point. Only those who really believe in what they are doing and persist will make something out of it.

Overall, it's not easy and the growth happens very slowly, but once you reach a stable significant growth, you are free and that is priceless. However, not everyone will succeed. Success will depend on a combination of factors: your endurance, perseverance, passion, luck, timing, help from others, market forces, random traffic flows, your skill in SEO (search engine optimization), and the popularity of your field of expertise or the niche you're involved in, among other factors. It's not something that anyone can just get up and do.

Now keep in mind that we talking about automated online passive income here, not active online income where you teach English through Skype, ship products through Ebay, or do freelance work for others. In active online income work, your payment is more fixed and predictable - depending on the hours you work, items you sell, rate of pay per article you write, or whatever deal you've negotiated with the client.

[Scepcop]

I just wrote my own guide to making money online that is practical, realistic and no-nonsense with no rosy claims. You can check it out here:

http://intellectualexpat.blogspot.com/2 ... ncome.html

[Scepcop]

Check out this comment in my blog about Pat Flynn. It's so spot on and describes his scheme to a T!

http://intellectualexpat.blogspot.com/2 ... 7438575527

"jmiJuly 15, 2012 4:51 AM

This is not complicated.

Tim Ferris does the same thing. Sure, Tim had something called BrainQuicken that made money, but the REAL muse is to tell you how to do the same thing as him. The fact that you are reading the 4 hour workweek, means that you are creating his lifestyle for him. The ultimate niche is to make money off those who are making money.

The same goes for Pat. He has an authority site. He has made himself, in the eyes of many, the de facto expert on passive income. So people visit his site... and he makes money from them. What is even more ridiculous is that Pat actually tells you on his blog that his most profitable page is his RESOURCE page.

It's like this:

(1) Make claims about making money on the internet (show big dollars)
(2) Give tonnes of free advice on every subject related to niche marketing (95% re-hashed from other stuff, and warrior forum) so that people will think you are a stand-up gentleman... building a RELATIONSHIP with them.
(3) Create a brand around your personality so that you are likeable, get them to buy into your brand with your free advice.
(4) Share how you "did it", which incidentally is a list of links to other products that his affiliate for
(5) Offer "proof" of your success - Security Guard HQ. Which is only 5% of your revenue, but hey, it's proof - right?
(6) Now that you love him, like his free advice, seen his proof, you notice that he keeps going on about bluehost - you buy it because it is only $6 a month for unlimited sites. And he walks away with a cool $65 per referral. BANK.

It doesn't even matter whether or not his original claims are true, or whether his current claims are true. He is making coin. He has copied Tim Ferris... and I can't believe there is even a debate here.

He is a very smart guy. And what is even more laughable... is that he tells you EVERYTHING on his website... including how he is making money off his visitors. He even has an diagram right now, and delivers speeches on making relationships with people and indirect selling.

Anyone who buys into it.... #epicfail.

The only way to make money of Pat Flynn is to compete with him, and knock him off his perch. Good luck with that, he has too many fan boys. Unless you are a really attractive female, in which you may have a good chance because most of the bozos are probably male."

My response to him:

"Jmi,
Yes, you've described Pat's scheme to a T! You really understand how the game works. Congrats. You are a person of solid common sense who tells it like it is.

Yes that is how these schemes work. This is in a gray area though, because making money by teaching others how to make money is a bit shady. It's not profiting from a legitimate business, but more along the lines of an MLM.

But hey, he is good at what he does and has found his niche, so you can't blame him.

The flaw in this scheme is that:

1) Not everyone can be at the top in a niche. There isn't room.
2) You can't succeed by just following a formula. It doesn't work that way. Too many other factors come into play, such as talent, passion, drive, dedication, luck, timing, market demand and availability, charisma, karma, destiny, divine will, and other intangibles.

But hey, giving people hope is better than nothing, since working for someone else is a prison-like enslaving existence. At least Pat and I agree on that. As long as he doesn't give people false or unrealistic hope, which would lead to disappointment. People need to learn how to think critically though."

[Oryon]

Hi Guys,

I've used Pat Flynn's board for a while and here are my 2 cents:

1) All of his sites are extremely knowledgeable, full of information and helpful. They are far from being the typical "money catching scams" that you find around. I just wish all of the websites on the internet were like his. One free blog post of his is well worth a 1000 money making eBooks you buy at $10 each!

2) Pat frankly admits that he makes over 80% of his profits from his internet marketing related activities.

3) Pat frankly admits that giving away advice for free is his way to attract customers to buy the stuff he markets. You can check his "Power of Free" seminar for this.

4) All of the products Pat markets out on his blog are legitimate and useful. i use most of them and they are the best tools you will find around for internet marketing minus a couple of exceptions that may be not the best but second best.

5) His site is valued at $450,000 meaning his monthly income is valued at +/- $37,000 through ad words. As he does not run ads and is opting for a different business model it is presumable that this model makes him more than $37,000 per month. So his income claims are probably correct based on this data.

Lastly, I am sorry but I can't understand your point??? How does offering basically a free course in internet marketing make him a scammer? What Pat teaches are the same techniques you would learn at college and what I paid $$$ for on Lynda.com to learn before I knew he existed. Are you saying that all college professors teaching marketing are scammers because they make a living by basically showing others how to make money? That is what your posts seem to say and it so doesn't make sense to me.

If we were talking about Google Sniper or the Empower Network or similar tactics that sell false hopes of making money that will never come to the poor people who believe the one million overnight dream, that would be a different story but here we're talking about a 100% legitimate business. Of course not everyone has the skills to make money online - not everyone can make use of what they learn from a college professor, lynda.com or Pat Flynn. But that doesn't mean it can't be done.

Remember in the end that every entrepreneur's main goal is to make money, not help others, do charity or make the world a better place. That doesn't make anyone a scammer if they earn that money by selling VALUE, which is what Pat does. He is popular and trusted because he is a positive person that is as much honest as a business man can with his customers.

The real secret to making money online is being passionate, truthful, open, more personal than professional, treat others with respect and most importantly keep it positive all the time! You can have all the SEO skills in this world. If you don't provide value (both with the product but also a social value) to the users, you'll just be one of another million folks out there trying to get $$$ for nothing.

Cheers!

[Scepcop]

Hi Oryon,
I don't disagree that Pat Flynn's sites are very informative and give away a lot of free info. But I doubt that he makes $37,000 a month. Anyone can say something like that. In my experience, if you tell the truth about everything, it doesn't tend to make you popular. Nor does it make a lot of money. You have to throw in some BS. Who do you know that became rich by telling the truth about everything?

Sites are always overvalued. My other site that I make a living off of, is also valued highly by third party sites, that overestimate my income.

I didn't say he was a scam because he was offering free internet marketing courses. I said that his claims were misleading.

First, it is highly improbable that he made $8,000 a month when he first monetized his site. Any honest article on passive income will tell you that in any startup business, whether a traditional small business or website, you go the first few months or more without earning anything. Then the income starts to trickle in. But you don't start at $8,000 net profit your first month. No way bud. You're dreaming.

You also forget that just because Pat Flynn says something, doesn't make it so. There is no reason to believe that he's an honest Abe who would never lie or exaggerate or distort.

Second, Pat Flynn has not shown to be successful in running real internet businesses, only in internet marketing sites. You ask what's wrong with that. It's just a little shady. If your real business is in helping others run a business, then you are supposed to be good at it in that you have a real business outside of the internet marketing arena. You get what I'm saying? In other words, he's not a proven success in a real internet business. Simply making money by helping other people make money is a shady area. It's how MLM makes money too, and we all know how deceptive and misleading MLM is. Distributors in MLM's make money by helping their downline make money. They don't really sell the product, they sell a dream.

Do you get what I'm saying?

[NinjaPuppy]

[Scepcop]

Great quote Ninjapuppy.

Check this out. A lot of Pat Flynn's followers found my blog article attacking him and have come to defend him in the comments section, while attacking me at the same time. lol

http://blog.happierabroad.com/2011/12/p ... ncome.html

[NinjaPuppy]