In surprising news, it turns out that Robert Kiyosaki, the author of the famed book Rich Dad, Poor Dad isn’t a big fan of his own program. The “how to save and make money” seminar series has been one of the more successful affiliate marketing programs, and is heavily promoted on Facebook and Google. Unfortunately, according to CBC in Canada, his program is far from anything about how to make money, but how to shell out your money to the Whitney Information Network. In this video he denies any involvement with his own seminars, and says he will look into the licensing of his name.

Unfortunatately, for those who attend these seminars, they are met with “get rich fast” schemes  that do nothing but take their money. A quick google search of Russ Whitney does not show great things about this fellow and the work that he does. It seems that he has a long history of engaging in questionable get-rich quick schemes that do not do as they promise.

  These schemes unfortunately hurt our industry significantly. The more that consumers associate direct response marketing and interactive advertising with fraud, the less likely they are to respond to ads. When this type of stuff gets in the news, it only makes consumers believe that all programs and advertisers on the internet are complete trash. I’m one of those people who really wonder if any of these programs work: I get at least 100 twitter messages a day saying to go to some “MoneyMaking Program” that will make me “thousands” a month.

  It’s easy to make quick money in this industry, and many of us fall into the trap of trying to find the newest way to capitalize on the industry. How many people have jumped on the twitter bandwagon, claiming to have the next program that will help monetize consumers? As I’ve mentioned before, despite there being tons of companies that claim to have the key, none of them are actually making “significant” income, because their business model isn’t long term – they are all hoping that some other company will look beyond this and gobble them up for a few million now.

  Similarly, almost every major ad network for a while ran advertising for Acai Flogs (Fake Blogs) and flashy banners that said “You’ve won.” They were happy then when the click-through rates were 4% and they were making money. Many of those same networks are now close to bankruptcy. All their sites have left the network, they have few relationships with major agencies and they are wondering where all the money went. Companies like Gorilla Nation, who have held out during the years to develop a strong vertical network, turning down the get-rich offers, are now finding themselves on top of the world.

  Now the RichDad seminars have been exposed, and unfortunately Mr. Kiyosaki, whose books often emphasized relationships may have his brand destroyed. We all need to take heed on this when we look for get-rich, quick money making ways.