Here’s what NOT to do—if you are an entrepreneur or marketer keen on keeping your brood of loyal customers patronising your offers:

Let me tell you a story about a recent negative experience I’ve had with a well-known coaching program.

(If you’re an affiliate marketer with a few years up your belt developing offers and selling them to your list—you’ve most certainly HEARD of them before…)

Here’s what happened:

I signed up to their programme, because I wanted to apply their marketing system on upcoming client works to come.

I emailed the coach directly. Asked him if I could join their programme.

No marketing needed from them to pull me in…

I didn’t need to read the sales page— I just wanted access to their programme.

At first, everything went smoothly.

I paid the $2,000 programme fees and got in.

And boy was I excited to start!

Which was where Problem One began….

The course is drip-fed.

Which means you need to go through Module One…then take a quiz at the module’s end before Module Two unlocks. This continues to Module Three—and so on.

I wanted to get access to Module Three and Six IMMEDIATELY.

These sections contained the core concepts that I wanted to apply to some super-important client projects—with time and money at stake. So I emailed the course’s support…

I asked them if they can unlock the specific modules…in the nicest possible way. 

They said no.

This means I have to go through over 20 LONG HOURS of content. Completing EVERY quiz across the board—just to access a few key nuggets for my own projects…

Doesn’t seem very good to me.

But I guess they have a reason for the quizzes and all?

Then Problem Two struck….

This came about after I followed the advice of the course coach about networking and building relationships with the other students in the course’s exclusive forum,

I tried to introduce myself. 

Find openings to reach out to folks on the same learning journey as I am. 

Maybe they had some insights from the modules I myself might have missed on.

And you know what?

They blocked me from making 

ANY networking requests!

Deleted all my comments.

Gave their BS reasons why they didn’t meet the forum guidelines.

But I strongly suspect it’s because I’m a copywriter.

Most of their target audience are small business owners and entrepreneurs keen on learning up their marketing system.

If I introduce myself as a copywriter…

…the higher-ups MIGHT be worried their students will jump-ship over to ME

So they used their veto power to shut me down.

The third red flag?

Most sadly, it was from the BIGGEST selling point of the course.

As with many programmes these days, it has a live coaching section.

Twice-a-month live coaching sessions. 

Here, you get your questions answered by experts trained under the course’s system itself. 

Pretty much a steal as there’s no better way to learn than from others’ experiences. 

And that totally transforms a humble collection of video training into a full-blown implementation programme for action-takers!

Problem is…

…the live calls are in the MIDDLE of the night!

So I emailed them asking how I could submit my questions in advance—so I could watch the live call’s recordings later in the morning.

Killing my beauty sleep (and health) just for questions is insanity.

Yet, I got pushed off the ledge—I could only get my questions answered ONLY IF I came
for the live sessions. 

So that makes three ‘red card’ strikes for this programme so far… 

It doesn’t really make sense to me.

It doesn’t seem like this particular brand’s mojo.

Perhaps a few of the course’s team members do care a bit for the folks who attend
their sessions…

Perhaps they do want some results to showcase as future customer magnets…

But when someone specifically goes to you—joins your course WITHOUT any FOMO-driven marketing to drive him in—and then you DON’T allow access to all of the perks inside it…

…let’s say there’s something wrong with
your ENTIRE business…

I’m much more likely as someone who paid $2,000 without seeing any marketing material to join the higher-priced coaching and masterminds…compared to the folks wading through all the funnels to be begged into the purchase. 

Yet too many half-witted business folks burn all their efforts on people LESS likely to invest in higher-priced offers!

A major mistake—in my opinion.

Lesson here to note?

Have a support team that TRULY understands your mission values and core principles behind the plans for your course, physical product, professional service, etc.

That way, you won’t have some $10-an-hour virtual assistant on your support team destroying relationships with folks—who might turn into ‘whales’ buying up your most expensive offers in future.

Tough takeaways for tough entrepreneurs indeed.