jimfurr

I would like to mention this thing about "Footprints".

If you use Adsense, you have a footprint.
Does not matter what else you do,
Google knows who you are and
where your sites are.

Take your Adsense Pub- ID
and Google it. You will find
ALL your Adsense sites
listed. Now that's a
big Footprint!

Jim Furr ><>

Zach

My advice is to be very careful "investing" in this type of product!

Ever heard of WarChestBuilder.com? Their site is still up but no content has been added. They offered a similar service which would build unlimited sites with the objective of making $.50 - $1.00 for only a one-time payment of $5,000! They had a real sneaky way of signing up people because they led you to believe that you had to "apply" for membership when in reality anyone with a credit card could join. On ya, there was also a $175/mo. membership for "support". Some people made some money with WCB but it was no surprise that Google caught on and everyone's income stream disappeared overnight. So the service set idle for months while they worked on a "fix". Of course, those who were beyond the 90 day guarantee period were screwed! They eventually decided to put the program on their own server (originally you put the program on your own servers) and now it's suppose to build WP sites.

Again, be very careful before you "invest" in an automation program like this. I think the key question is, and always will be, why someone who has developed an auto-build software would sell it? After all, if the program worked as well a they claim, then why not build your own network of thousands of sites and keep all the profits for yourself! Who needs to sell a software program if you're making 6 figures every month???

I remember when I was tempted to buy WCB (thank God I didn't) that someone here on the WF pointed out that you could buy profitable sites a flippa and elsewhere for much less than $5,000 and $175/mo. fees. I ended up doing just that. I bought several sites at flippa for much less than $5,000 and today everyone of them continues to put money in my "hip national bank" and it continues to grow every month. And, I don't have to worry about the big "G' coming along and wiping out my income stream overnight because these are all authority sites!

Buyer beware folks!

JanPat

I've been using Speedlings for nearly a year.

I'm not allowed to say bad things about Speedlings (by written agreement), so you'll just heard positive stuff and facts here.

First, it costs $5000 to get started with Speedlings. You get 30 domain credits so... you need to invest more to keep you performance refund guarantee.

The deal is you you need to create 30 more sites each month over a year. For the most part, you need to buy the domain credits through Speedlings at a minimum cost of $14 each (with their $5000 approx 330 domain package). That said, it's roughly $11,000 in to keep your 12 month performance guarantee.

I'm up to hundreds of Speedling sites following the program. Some sites are pulling in revenue but in total it's less than $900 so far. Not quite recouped my costs after nearly a year, so I'm not in a position to recommend Speedlings yet. Still hopeful positive for the near future, since I'm in it deep with thousands on the line.

I have to give it to Speedlings in that it can put up a site fast. I've checked out other autoblog stuff, and nothing compares... yet. The revenue channels (you can't get on your own like Shopping.com) is pretty nifty too.

I do wonder about the footprint remark earlier. There are common signatures with Speedling sites (like shared themes and "Powered by Speedlings" on every page). Could this jeopardize all Speedlings sites in one search engine swoop? Last I heard, there are over 174,000 sites so this could be a huge footprint. Any feedback on this would be good.

Besides this, I do wonder why Speedlings isn't more transparent. For example, why do they need an agreement that doesn't allow it's customers to share information to others who are considering plunking down thousands of dollars. What if there is something really bad that prospects should know before signing up? Like with anything else, caveat emptor -- along with this bit of info to consider.

gcintermed

You have to wonder about any program that makes you agree in writing not to say anything bad about them! I can't imagine that would be enforeceable.

SamWilsonLaw

I know spellings members and advise one in particular. I'm not a member, so thankfully I can talk about what I know with candor.

Before anything, always read any contract before you sign. If you don't understand something in the document, ask or seek professional advice (in no way does this post constitute legal advice).

I looked over the Agreement, and the following should be taken into serious consideration:

1) The Agreement appears to be in the favour of Adam Ginsberg International (aka AGI). AGI may change the terms of the agreement to their choosing with indirect notice. It's up to you to check for changes in their terms of service.
2) Jan is right about the disclosure restriction. You can't speak poorly about them. I haven't seen any evidence of these boundaries being tested tested yet; however, I would not be surprised if AGI pre-empts with the threat of legal action first.
3) AGI has the right -- in my loose interpretation -- to boot you from their service at their choosing.
4) The Agreement forces arbitration before court claim proceedings: it doesn't appear you can immediately file suit against AGI in court, although this requirement could be challenged in my opinion -- especially if there are several claims to make for larger action.

That said, buyer beware. Perform your due diligence, and I highly recommend this with speedlings.

I agree there is limited transparency, and their practices are questionable in my opinion.

For example, I was made aware AGI arbitrarily terminates sites with "trademark infringing" domain names. How they decide on the trademark infringement is not known, except the threshold appears to be low. If there's any hint of a trademark term in the domain name they shut it down, no questions asked. No refund.

Meanwhile, AGI seems to demonstrate sites of their own which likely won't pass their own test. Taking Welcome to Tron Legacy Store for instance, the site was presented at a members-only webinar last month. For this matter, the site was presented as one which ranked in first place on Google.

When examined closer, I also found Adam's claim seemed distorted. The sit Welcome to Tron Legacy Store targets the keywords "tron legacy store" which has less than 60 searches (according to Google's keyword tool) and 1,620 competing sites (with an exact match Google query). In the webinar, Adam Ginsberg ran a broad match search in Google which pulled up over 6 million results. A little bit of an exaggeration (implying what Speedlings can do with competitive markets) in my mind. Search "tron legacy" in google and you'll find it hard to see Welcome to Tron Legacy Store anywhere in the top few hundred results.

As for AGI's $1 a day per site target, it's not known how many of the 100,000+ sites actually perform at this level 90%? 50%… 10%… 1%. If the percentage is obviously low, the $1 a day claim might not be reasonable.

From what I gathered, there are other aspects of the service which seem fuzzy, like their keyword research tool algorithm and business model.

In the webinars, Adam's asserted he doesn't make much money selling domains, which is probably true, but when the overall cost is looked at one must wonder where the money's going to. At the lowest price they (somewhat forcibly) sell domain credits to its members at $14 each, there would appear be at least a $5-6 delta from the wholesale cost of the domain. When you look at the WHOIS registration for Speedling acquired domains, they're all registered to a single entity likely also owned by AGI, which would lead one to deduce they're in the domain privacy proxy business too.

At $5 a domain (for supposed domain proxy service) for just 100,000 sites, that's a half million dollar a year profit center for AGI. One has to wonder why AGI makes it somewhat troublesome (likely cost ineffective) for members to use their own domains with Speedlings.

Looking at their keyword tool, one has to wonder how it arrives at the Speedlings "speed rating." The basic principle is to create sites with keywords with green or yellow "speed ratings" but when one looks closer, some green rated keyword search terms would probably be hard to rank, if not impossible within the 12 month guarantee period. Taking highly search terms like "Stop Forclosure" (e.g. Welcome to Adam Ginsberg Stops Foreclosure) the keyword tool would show a green rating, leading one to believe a Speedling sites could outrank more established high ranking sites.

As a SEO person, certain keywords are so competitive it would take too much effort and time to go after, and many of the green rated terms would be useless in my opinion. My question would be why won't AGI explain how its keyword tool works exactly? What's also questionable are Adam's changes to his Speeding's approach with sites. At one time, he encouraged going after highly competitive keywords (in recorded webinars), but now he's slowly and subtly moving away from that. Personally, I'm not convinced he knows what he's doing from a SEO / traffic perspective.

Speedlings has also had its fair bit of challenges with Twitter, which was what it largely relied on at one point. The Speedling tool automated Twitter posts, which largely amounted to Twitter spam, but hasn't worked for months (for whatever reason). I wouldn't be surprised if it's partly due to the fact Twitter doesn't like what Speedlings is doing.

Another consideration is that members are at the mercy of Speedlings. If Speedlings shuts down or gets shut out for any reason (e.g. court or FTC action or broad stroke search engine ban), members are out of luck. You really have to put trust in Speedings before jumping in, or you're going in blind. Personally, the lack of transparency, risks and unanswered questions would make it hard to go along with them.

There are other matters to consider, but for the time being, I suggest thinking carefully before handing over your hard earned money to them.

Sam

SamWilsonLaw

I was asked in an email about what "forces" members to buy domains through Speedlings. Well, it's this: to use your own domains (i.e. registered through GoDaddy) you have to pay $10 to "transfer" it into Speedlings. This isn't automatic either. You need to open a support ticket to do it. Extra cost and a hassle if you ask me.

Not only this. AGI (in its Agreement) will not count domains toward the minimum 30 sites per month performance guarantee -- if you did not buy through Speedlings. You must buy the domains through Speedlings to get the money back guarantee.

You have to wonder why would they do this. What makes a domain you get elsewhere (for as low as $8 with privacy protection -- $6 less than Speedling's lowest price) less worthy in performance for it not to count.

When you look at someone like Yano (the winner of the last Speedlings make-as-many-sites-as-you-can contest), he created over 2,000 web sites in Speedlings. At over $5,000 to buy 330 domains through Speedlings, that's more $30,000 - every year in domain costs on top of Speedlings renewal (probably $2000 annually in his case). Hope he did proper research for each of those site keywords to recoup his cost. Oh yeah. What did he win? Something like 600 more domain credits -- more domains to pay another $10,000 in renewals to Speedlings next year. Wow! $40,000 - $50,000 every year to stay out of the red. I'm really curious if it's paying off for him so far.

For every Speedlings member, there is a yearly recurring cost for domains plus Speedlings renewal ($400 - $2000).

The big question is how many Speedlings member make back their $11,000 cost (for Speedlings and domains) before their 12 month performance guarantee is over, when they need to pay out thousands renewals or call it quits?

For $$$ "business" decisions like this. For the rah rah feel good cheer. We're dealing with real money that goes out, and real money that needs to come back in. These aren't casino chips we're playing with here. Show us the money! The Speedlings convention is this weekend, so it'll be interesting when some members share honest numbers with each other.

On the SEO I mentioned earlier, Adam has been recorded on webinars saying something to the effect that "Google makes up only 16% of the searches on the web." I'd like to see where he's getting that number and how that relates to Speedling web sites. Maybe there's some missing detail with that number (like EBay auction and Facebook specific searches are counted too?). Google is THE game in my opinion - in SEM.

So after this weekend kubaya convention, let's see what sort of revelations will come to the members who've spent over 10K, followed the Speedling instruction and program, and haven't made back their money as their year is almost up for renewal. How many of the hundreds of Speedlings member haven't made back their money yet? Give us real numbers.

Sam

p.s. I'll be at the Vegas convention with a member this weekend handing out business cards. Possibly more to report back here on this.

SamWilsonLaw

Here's what new now the Speedlings Vegas convention is over.

More questions and potentially more questionable practices. But before I dive in, let me share with you that I didn't meet anyone at the convention who could honestly say they've made back the money they've put into Speedlings so far. Sure, Adam asked if anyone made more than $1,800 and a few people in the audience (out of the hundreds of attendees) got up (personally I think the better question would have been how many of you members have made back the ten grand you sunk into Speedlings?).

Sure, most of the attendees were pumped with having Lou (the former Hulk) and other big name self-help speakers on stage, having a hypnotist make fools out a handful of volunteers, having a DJ blare pump it up music all weekend, and having Adam tell the group the best is to come. In my opinion though, it was just a big mask for what I would sum us as snake oil. Yes, you heard it right. I believe it's snake oil.

If you listen to Adam's words carefully, you'll hear that he doesn't make promises. You'll hear things like "expect" or "goal" but you need to ask on what foundation are the expectations based on. Any two cent salesman can try selling based on expectations and not promises e.g. buy my fitness program and expect to be come an Olympics athlete. Yeah right… get smart and read the fine print.

Now here's the new questionable stuff. Speedlings 2.0 (the new version of Speedlings) is out now. Adam says - out with the old and in with the new for 2011. Well, I believe we're still seeing the same old like poor software quality checking and forced spending on Speedlings. With the poor software quality checking it seems Adam has rolled out a bunch of defects, like past Speedlings releases. I'll leave it to another member to post the email Adam sent out a week after the convention explaining (and possible minimizing) the defects. Don't they quality check their software? It's been months since Speedling 2.0 was announced and surely it's been in development for much longer. What gives? I won't go into detail here about the Speedling 1.0 problems I've heard about... some of which which were supposed to be fixed in 2.0 but still aren't. All I'll say here is it's a pain in the butt long list in my mind.

Now the interesting thing about Speedling 2.0 is the abandonment of autoblogging for article marketing. After 12 months what gives with huge shift? Wasn't the Speedlings 1.0 autoblogging working? Why are members passively forced to switch over to 2.0? And why is Speedlings 2.0 rating most of the Speedlings 1.0 sites as "dogs" in the new admin panel? Some important info seems to missing here.

If you're a member, pay attention to the where the click throughs are going. Are the "Deal of the Day" ads taking all the traffic away from your other revenue channels like Adsense or Amazon links (besides the pages being too busy already). If DotDs are stealing the click throughs, have you wondered how you're going to tell if you're getting all the revenue? It's not like you own account (like Adsense, Clickbank or Amazon). How do you know Speedlings isn't taking a slice of the pie? Hmmmm...

Another change that comes with Speedlings 2.0 are the new limitations around articles. In 1.0 you could write your own content or have someone else of your choosing write if for you (I say write because the post feature didn't work with cut and paste most of the time -- what was up with that too?). In 2.0 it appears you have to buy the articles Speedlings 2.0. It seems you can't manually add your own content. The Speedlings article prices are much higher than other placed and the promise is 200-300 words, with many articles ending up around 2000 words -- a rip off in my opinion. Imagine that. No autoblogging and the only way to add unique content to a site is to buy it through Speedlings at seemingly inflated prices. Hmmmm… another profit center for AGI (now known as Speedlings Media International - SMI)?

There's still a lot more about Speedlings 2.0 you should know and be cautious about before handing over your cool cash. Despite the pump you up hype and hooray hoopla, I'm not impressed, and I would not recommend it at all today. Caveat emptor! I really hope this helps some unknowing Speedlings prospects.

Sam

SamWilsonLaw

Here's an update on the client of mine who's a Speedlings member, because it's not status quo since my previous post.

So far, he still hasn't even made back 2% of the money he's put into Speedlings. In fact, he's currently faced with thousands of dollars in unpaid and unmanageable debt, recurred annual Speedlings costs, and a divorce.

All his Speedling sites under-perform. Nearly half of all his Speedling sites have been de-indexed from Google since upgrading to Speedlings 2.0. Even the couple sites that were ranked on Google's first page are nowhere to be found in the SERP. What little traffic there was has fallen more than 50% after the upgrade, and the roughly hundred dollars a month revenue from his Speedlings sites has virtually all dried up.

What good are Speedling sites and the new flip strategy if Google rejects them, I ask? All of my client's hundreds of the sites under-perform, compared to the Speedling's revenue target.

Today, Adam Ginsberg's touts flipping sites and domain names as the best way to make money with Speedling sites. He's telling customers to create Speedling sites to sell to others - and he's doing it in a big way with a seminar and all. It would seem like the MO is to build crap and then sell it to a greater fool. Is this indicative of the Speedlings business MO? I don't know of anyone who's made back their cash outlay on Speedlings with the previous strategy, and I doubt the new strategy will work either.

If anyone's made back the $6,000 minimum outlay for Speedlings, I'd like to hear it. I have yet to meet anyone (who doesn't work for Speedlings) report that he / she's made back the Speedlings cash outlay.

Interestingly, Adam Ginsberg encouraged members on a recent webinar to invest in Speedlings for the long run. He's likened it to holding onto stocks that have fallen in value: hold onto to falling stocks because they'll come back in the long run.

As an experienced investor I disagree. The strategy I've followed from successful investor is to cut losses, and that's worked for me. I've lost thousands buying and holding onto falling stocks. If a stock's fallen enough in value, there's no way to tell if it'll come back - unless you can see the future e.g. who knew if falling Enron stocks would return to their glory. My client's also put some of his Speedling sites and not one has sold yet after months, so the evidence isn't promising. I doubt AGI / Ginsberg can reasonably substantiate their $1 a day a site revenue target, used in their sales pitch.

That said, I believe there's a case for legal action against AGI and Adam Ginsberg personally as such -- if regulatory action doesn't get them first, in my opinion.

By regulatory, I mean FTC action under unfair and deceptive trade practice rules… specifically around the way AGI / Ginsberg changes agreement terms at will - with limited notice (you have to regularly read the T&S to learn about the changes) and no expressed agreement. As a Speedlings consumer, your choices to reject the agreement term changes are limited: you'd have to walk away from all the money you put out because AGI / Ginsberg would probably argue their 12 month performance guarantee hadn't been met... contract by duress perhaps? I suspect the way AGI / Ginsberg changes performance guarantee will likely spawn several FTC complaints.

If you're having problems with the Speedlings money back performance guarantee, I recommend that you ask your lawyer whether the way AGI / Ginsberg changes its terms is a mutual agreement - or if it's an unfair practice.

In a nutshell, I strongly recommend staying far away from Speedlings since I'm not convinced it's smart use of your hard earned money.

GBMarkham

The following is being posted for an unfortunate Speedlings member and a friend so as to protect their anonymity.

I bought into Speedlings and boy am I sorry. It was hyped from the start. I sat in a room with about 500 people and watched Adam build a site in under 5 mins and he showed us live how he was generating a few pennies in about 15 mins of the launch. I never experienced this and suspect that he may have had some people clicking behind the scenes to generate results which, of course, would be really deceptive. Desiring a simple web building program I jumped at it and followed the recommended Speed ratings and was told that after 3 mos, I should see about $1 per day per site. I built over 400 sites quickly, which, in turn, disqualified me from his performance guarantee.

After almost 10 mos at this I barely made $100 from my $12000 investment. If I wish to keep the domains and rebuild them on my own, Speedlings charges $30 to transfer a domain I paid $16??? Speedlings is keeping my domains hostage.

Another thing that I noticed is that there are no member forums. It's as if Speedlings is keeping its members from talking. I have a feeling that there may be more displeased people out there but we have no way to communicate.

This has been pure rubbish and if you attend a presentation and are considering this, run as quickly as you can. This was a horrible investment and I think that the BBB and the district attorney should look into their selling practice.

JanPat

After giving it over a year, and reaching my financial breaking point, I'm starting to agree with Sam. I'm beginning to doubt Speedlings will ever pay off. I tried to stay positive, but I'm feeling more scammed and desperate than ever. I put in over ten thousand dollars and before I even got back 10% I'm hit with paying five plus thousands more for domain and mandatory privacy protection renewals (which Speedings is supposedly making money on).

I was sold on the Speedlings "goal" pitch of a dollar a day per site. When I did the math, that was suppose to be $360 per day, or roughy $10,000 per month (with the 360 sites required to maintain the Speedlings money back guarantee). Hey, a hundred and twenty thousand a year from Speedlings sites sounded good to me by that projection last year. Instead, after a whole year, I made less than $2 per day from all my hundreds of Speedling sites combined -- or less than $1,000 total. I did everything by the Speedlings book and now it sucks to be me to have bought into the "goal."

With Speedlings changing its terms without my explicit agreement so many times, I consulted my lawyer before asking for a refund and I was told I'd get screwed by the way they've set this up… so I'm putting more money in until there's some slim chance I'll make my money back or I go under financially first (I also have a house that's not worth the price anymore, so I'm just screwed any way I look at it).

I don't know... it seems like everything's changing all the time like musical chairs with Speedlings. Every time I work on something (like spending hours and days creating dozens of twitter accounts) as directed, it gets wiped out for something because the old stuff doesn't work as well as the new stuff. And the explanation I get is the Internet changes all the time.

I'm not happy that I was sold on an idea that never worked for me, and now Speedlings is off to chase a new strategy. Worse, what partially worked last year seems to have falling off a cliff. Over half my sites disappeared from Google after the Speedlings 2.0 upgrade and my revenue have dropped 90% since. According to an IM SEO expert friend, he thinks the Speedlings sites and strategy wouldn't have worked or been sustainable to start with. I wish I talk to him a year ago before getting in what I now think is a scam.The old Speedling article marketing game with duplicate content, Twitter spam, and strategy to hit highly competitive markets was an apparent recipe for disaster that would not have paid off anyway.

Today's Speedlings strategy of flipping domains might not pay off either. I'm also wondering how many of the Speedlings members on the so called success stories site have made back their money. It's all fine to put up incentive driven (yes, like get free domain credits, ipads or ipods, etc.) feel good testimonies.

To hear others in the similar situation as mine, I'm feeling even less encouraged with Speedlings. Marital breakdown, bankruptcy, desperation, are real life situations that shouldn't be caused by something like Speedlings… that seems like that's the reality after giving some time.

Sorry if I seem messed up with words right now. I'm just saying how I feel it is, and it don't feel good. I just hope not many others are going or will go through this with Speedlings.

Jan

Jason Fladlien

Jan,

If I were you I'd walk away ASAP from speedlings and not spend another minute of effort trying to get profit from those sites. It's a failing business model. I know is not sustainable for a fact because there is no value being created by you from these sites, so there is no wealth to be made.

Even if you can't get a refund from this (which I can't believe they won't grant you...) please don't throw good time after bad money.

Instead - start all over from scratch. But this time focus on developing skills that will create VALUE, which people would happily trade money for. That's the only truly sustainable business model.

gcintermed

Jason is absolutely right. In a world where software can instantly create unlimited websites with scraped content from other sites, the key question is where is the value?

In the case of Speedlings, it was apparent early on (see earlier posts in this thread), that the sites being generated offed NO value to visitors, and the value proposition was the hope and dreams of passive wealth that were sold to investors. In other words, it was a sophisticated con.

I know it is hard to admit that you've been conned, and hope dies hard. But it makes about as much sense to spend more money on Speedlings as it would to invest more cash with Bernie Madoff.

Chalk it up as an expensive learning experience and next time focus on what value is being created for others, because that will be a good indicator of how much profit you can earn.

xxxJamesxxx

I saw him speak at a Seminar in London at the start of the year and boy he was slick.

...He even asked to turn off the cameras for a minute just so he could call the last speaker a scammer! To me, at the time, really helped to build trust and gave the feeling of "I'm on your side".

I even met a guy who was raving about Speedlings system and he paid $5000 or $6000... Can't remember. I asked him if he made any money yet and he said "No, it takes 5 months start making money with the Speedlings system"

Kinda feel sorry for him now because he was spending a ton of the domains etc.

James Scholes

jkcashflow

Don't do it.
No refund allowed, and it is a very expensive software that doesn't work as it says, the "cookie cutter" sites are garbage. He them asks for an extra subscription after a few months, even when it is made clear there is no additional costs when you sign.
I know MANY people that have bought in and got burned on this one. Total garbage.
I have heard of a class action being taken against Adam Ginsberg as well. AVOID!