On the 23rd of last month, I bought a product from the mailing list of an IM Guru by the name of Shawn Casey. One of the options on the sales page was to join his 10K A Month Club for a 30 day trial period so I did to see what it was all about.

The very same day I entered the club eager to see what sort of valuable content was inside. To my extreme disappointment the site was nothing more then a set of pages with links scattered all over that led to other pages with more of the same links scattered around. Yes there was content on some of those pages but for the most part the site was a jumbled mess that looked like it was made by a 5 year old.

I soon discovered that Mr. Casey employed his brother, Scott, as the webmaster for the site.

I am a visually oriented person so the thing I found most disconcerting about the site was a link that said "More Video Training." Upon clicking the link I arrived on another page quite similar to the first that was once again full of links and, that's right, no videos. It was at this point that I decided to leave the site and contact Mr. Casey's helpdesk informing him of my displeasure and the fact that someone with his claims of riches should be employing someone who has at least the slightest clue about Information Architecture.

The next day my request for membership cancellation was honored and, to my surprise, the price I paid for the product I purchased was refunded. Bare in mind the product I purchased was a digital product so I already had the product sitting on my hard drive at that point.

Jump forward to this morning. I'm woken up by my roommate informing me Shawn Casey is on the phone. Well, it wasn't Mr. Casey but it was someone from his training consultant program. The individual informed me that he was calling on behalf of Mr. Casey regarding assisting me to succeed in affiliate Marketing in exchange for my testimonial. Here's a good place to leave the story and get right down to the Q&A.

Has anyone here ever had any dealings with Shawn Casey, and if so what is your opinion/story?

I do not really know much about it, but i would advice you to be extra careful. Sometimes this could be a trick to persuade you that they are credible enough so that you can trust them with your money. I've known of many occassions for that so please think twice before giving money to people.

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Computer and Programming Tips Blog

Exactly! Besides the first time they ask for me to give them money I'll be saying bye-bye. They offered the training in exchange for testimonial. They can suggest all the tools they want but when they start telling me that in order to complete my training I'll need to buy this or that from them then it's adios!

Also, be careful about any financial transactions.

While not everyone seems to be a Paypal fan, I am, and for just such a need as this. If you do not really know who you are dealing with it is essential to protect yourself. Never give people you do not know a credit card number or any such thing, not to mention bank account info.

If you have observed the extensive and sneaky procedures people spend time on just to get a spam post on this forum, it is not surprising how far they will go to get your financial info.

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Good Success!

Douglas County Master Gardeners
"We don't always get what we want, but we always get what we expect."

Oh no worries there! I'm super paranoid about giving my credit card/bank account info out over the phone, especially in a case like this where I already have suspicions about the guys validity.

There are just way too many oddities already; the flaky website, getting a "Welcome Aboard" letter (consisting of bogus login info) from Mack Michael of Maverick Money Makers, immediately after purchasing the product from Shawn Casey. Mack Michael sending me several emails offering me a free consultation with his Advisory board "...since" I'm "a MMM member" (rolls-eyes) and then, after ignoring Mack Michael's offer, having Shawn Casey's consultation team seek me out, unsolicited. All these factors, add up to uber paranoia and distrust of anyone linked to these guys! But since their offering the entertainment, I figure what the heck.

Right. I didn't really think you would from the tone of your post, but I do a lot on the financial side of things and posted for the forum in general.

We have a lot of members and many have not yet learned to be so cautious. The amount of id theft and fraud going on shows that a lot of people do get sucked in. Otherwise these folks would not be so successful.

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Good Success!

Douglas County Master Gardeners
"We don't always get what we want, but we always get what we expect."

Ahhhh... well stop doing that! you're making me paranoid! j/k

Seriously, please don't let my overly self-consciousness replies keep you from pointing these things out! Education of the masses is after-all the point forums like this!

I have had an experience with Shawn Casey's group contacting me about using my testimonial as payment for their training after signing up for the 10K club and believe me if you had taken them to the next level they would have tried hard selling you on an 8-12K training package.

A help desk phone number I located is 800/750-3436 and I will try to cancel my membership tomorrow before they charge a $99.00 monthlry fee. I keep everyone updated with my success. Thanks for the information.

Thanks for sharing Zenchronicity!

Another person to watch out for is Matt Bacak. I recently got a call from his reps. He asked me pretty much the same questions Shawn Casey's reps asked and then started probing to see if I had any money stashed away for a rainy day so-to-speak. When I told him that I didn't have any savings nor access to credit he quickly ended the call promising to call back or send me $750 worth of free product for my time. He's done neither.