Stock, Options or Forex Trading Seminars - How To Select One
August 3, 2008
Anyone who has watched any late night TV recently cannot have failed to have noticed the many comercials trying to sell you on a series of trading seminars which promise will change your life and make you rich.
These seminars will represent a very large investment for most people so care has to be taken when selecting a seminar educational company. In this article you will find a few good tips about what to look out for if you call that 1 800 number.
There are quite a few companies that got into the trading seminar business recently, at least in the last 5 years. This has been fuelled by the meltdown of the market during 2000-2003 which has led many investors and traders want to self direct and manage their own money. The less attractive option is leaving it in the hands of an often less than competent fund manger, who may not have your best interests at heart.
Some of the companies that that advertise extensively on late night TV are Investools, Optionetics, Bettertrades and Star Trader. I’m very familiar with these companies as I’ve attended the free warm up selling seminar for all of them, and actually bought and attended seminars from 3.
The usual sales cycle is as follows, the infomercial is designed to get you to attend what I call the FREE warm up selling seminar. This seminar is usually in a local hotel and can last anything from 30 minutes to 3 hours. From my experience the free Investools seminar lasted about 3 hours and was actually very informative and educational. The others were much shorter and really nothing more than sales pitch’s to get you to sign up for a starter seminar which could cost anything from $199 to $4K!.
At the free seminar you will be encouraged to sign up on the spot using your credit card, this is usually after you are offered a large discount over the retail price for being a “discision maker”. Most come with a set of DVD’s and manual allowing you to study before the live seminar.
If you do sign up at one of these free seminars here are a few points to consider:
1. Don’t be shy about asking what the refund policy is up front. Understand how long you have to evaluate the training materials because this can very a lot between different companies. It could be only until noon on the 1st day or you may be allowed to stay the whole 1st day before having to ask for a refund.
2. If you are allowed to bring a 2nd person to the seminar at no extra cost, then take advantage of this. It is very valuable to have a 2nd opinion about the merits of a seminar since it will be an expensive investment. If you are not allowed a 2nd person it may not be a good deal.
3. Check that you are paying the lowest price possible for the seminar. You don’t want to end up in the seminar and find that the person next to paid a lot less for the same seat, just like on airlines!
4. If you are new to trading you may not be exactly sure what you need to learn, and it can be quite confusing. Make sure that the seminar that you are taking is on the right subject matter. A basic stocks course will not cover anything on options and visa versa, and a forex course will not cover either etc.
Here is something that you need to know, this is very important. All these seminar companies are not going to teach you everything you need to know about trading at one seminar, even if it cost $4K. They all have follow on seminars and courses, and they pretty quickly start to tell you that the seminar you have just attended and paid for is just the basic course and if you really want to be a trader you must buy the other more advanced seminars.
During your beginner seminar expect the presenters to consistently tell you that you have just begun your educational journey and that if you really want to make the big money you need much more education. I know it sucks but it’s not illegal, it’s how corpoate America works!.
I would only recommend buying additional seminars or material from a company if you are very satisfied with what you have seen so far, and only buy in small increments. The reason is that usually you don’t get any refund period guarantee’s on additional buys other than the usual state 3 day cooling off period, which is not much use if you are just signed up for 2 years of seminars!.
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