Watch out for Free Offers – Most of the Time, They are a Scam

I really need to stop listening to Sirius. Sirius, as well as XM radio, will allow anyone to buy marketing time and say anything. I have found that most of the time these commercials that air on satellite radio fall into the “irresponsible marketing” category.

My favorite one is by “self titled stock market genius” Ross Jardine. Here are his claims:

"I've taught thousands to make money in the stock market and I want to teach you for free!"
~ Ross Jardine

• Fast and Easy (15 minutes a day)
• Consistent Income Every Month
• Profit in both Up and Down Markets
• Take Control of your Financial Future

So, he wants to send you his free investor’s stock market kit and make you rich. Well, let’s talk about this “free” offer. It will cost you a “processing and handling fee” of $ 9.95. He sends you a CD that probably costs roughly $ 1.50 to $ 2 to produce (that is probably on the high side). He pays another $ 0.75 or so for postage and pays for advertizing. I would suspect he is making a pretty good penny per free offer. Plus you have to sign up for his service (he will not tell you the cost on his site – you have to pay him $ 9.95 to find out the cost) to get the subscription cost.

That doesn’t sound free to me. Then in order to learn and discover the “holy grail,” you have to buy and subscribe and spend lots of money.

First of all, repeat after me. There is no holy grail in investing. There is no quick way to get rich. If there were, no one would tell anyone. Secondly, this is nothing more than a marketing scam to sell product.

Mr. Jardine, with all due respect, don’t talk about teaching people to invest for free when it is not true. If you want to sell a book for $ 9.95, then sell one.

Copyright © 2008 Prudent Money and Bob Brooks. All rights reserved.