What Do You Really Think About "Rich Jerk" Type Sites?

[sbucciarel]

Originally Posted by KellyFelix

Hahaha. Man this really cracked me up!

My Facebook page does list my employer as "Vandelay Industries" in Manhattan, and my occupation as "Latex Salesman". Anyone get the reference? LOL

From the horses mouth.
Da man is in the house.

[loisl]

Going on this thread alone, I think it's obvious this guy has been successful in his branding efforts, if nothing else.

I have found his approach amusing and have hung around on the site long enough to be entertained but it stops there.

[discrat]

Originally Posted by TheRichJerksNet

I would not buy into such crap ... For one his site claimed he lived in a city I am close to and I know he did not live here and further investigations found out many things that was nothing but hype ..

I will not go into that on this forum but to answer the OP anyone that falls for the bullcrap must be a newbie.

James

To me I look at it differently. And I think you are taking it waaaayy to personal here.

I see it as a Guy who was smart enough and clever enough and had an incredible imagination and creativity to develop a Persona and ultimately a Brand (which people love to hate) that has literally raked in millions of dollars during a period of a few years.

Pure Marketing genius , plain and simple . Its Branding 101 and something you cant learn at Harvard Business School. You either have it or you dont !!

And this Mother Trucker definitely had it !!

Iam sure a lot of the big time Gurus out there will say things to discredit this guy. Maybe it is out of jealousy because they were incapable of coming up with such true Marketing brillance.

But I think we can ALL learn a great deal from some of the Marketing strategies he used whether you agree with the Rich Jerk premise or not. !!

You Rock Kelly !!
Wow, the Rich Jerk coming on Warrior Forum.......Who would of thought !!

[EdmondDantes]

Originally Posted by sbucciarel

From the horses mouth.
Da man is in the house.

Kelly is dope...

...Most folks turn their food into glucose, but Kelly turns his into plutonium.

(You know, for his brain)

It's all happening,

Mike Long

[redicelander]

Originally Posted by KellyFelix

Hahaha. Man this really cracked me up!

My Facebook page does list my employer as "Vandelay Industries" in Manhattan, and my occupation as "Latex Salesman". Anyone get the reference? LOL

Seinfeld. Pretty funny dude, pretty funny. Amazing to see the actual rich jerk here on the forum. Not my style but I assume you made a lot of money off of it.

[Keywordology]

Regardless of what you may think of it, it was unique when it first came out compared to everything else. But it's been so overused now that I think even newbies see it a mile away.

[sbucciarel]

Well, he sold me his ebook and I'm the biggest skeptic around. I don't buy ebooks. I went to the site 10 times before I bought and figured well, the site is so amusing that it's worth the money for the ebook.

The access to his forum was priceless. I made a lot of money and some friends there.

Plus ... I'm on very few lists. I dump them at a blinding rate, but I never unsubscribed from RJ's list. The last email I got if I recall was a few days ago

Subject: OPEN IT DAMMIT

I did.

[DogScout]

Originally Posted by KellyFelix

Hahaha. Man this really cracked me up!

My Facebook page does list my employer as "Vandelay Industries" in Manhattan, and my occupation as "Latex Salesman". Anyone get the reference? LOL

The fact he showed up here shows he probably monitors internet activity for his brands. Something many large corporations are still learning to do... the hard way. His adwords account is humming so he is obviously knows how to do the do. I never bought his ebooks or anything but if they are not up to par, you could always take a lesson by watching what he is doing. Lol.

[travlinguy]

I found Rich Jerk offensive. Still there was something to learn with his approach and style. The funny thing is this, the whole thing wasn't really about the stuff in his ebook, which was rehashed material that could be found in any decent 'info product' PLR package.

His main business was Web hosting but most people missed that. When you subscribed to his 'system' you got a free cookie cutter Website. Yeah, sure... free.

The hook was that you had to host through his company at $10 a month. That's some nice residual income when you multiply it by tens if not hundreds of thousands of jerks, errrr... members. There's nothing new under the sun, just new suckers to make it look so.

These days success is measured almost exclusively by your gross and net. I guess it doesn't much matter if you berate people and hype the living crap out of ancient info to make it look fresh.

[sandra.IMqueen]

Thanks for cutting to the chase.

[EdmondDantes]

Originally Posted by travlinguy

I found Rich Jerk offensive. Still there was something to learn with his approach and style. The funny thing is this, the whole thing wasn't really about the stuff in his ebook, which was rehashed material that could be found in any decent 'info product' PLR package.

His main business was Web hosting but most people missed that. When you subscribed to his 'system' you got a free cookie cutter Website. Yeah, sure... free.

The hook was that you had to host through his company at $10 a month. That's some nice residual income when you multiply it by tens if not hundreds of thousands of jerks, errrr... members. There's nothing new under the sun, just new suckers to make it look so.

These days success is measured almost exclusively by your gross and net. I guess it doesn't much matter if you berate people and hype the living crap out of ancient info to make it look fresh.

I thought the most important word in that post was "fresh."

It's all happening,

- Mike Long

[sbucciarel]

Originally Posted by travlinguy

I found Rich Jerk offensive. Still there was something to learn with his approach and style. The funny thing is this, the whole thing wasn't really about the stuff in his ebook, which was rehashed material that could be found in any decent 'info product' PLR package.

His main business was Web hosting but most people missed that. When you subscribed to his 'system' you got a free cookie cutter Website. Yeah, sure... free.

The hook was that you had to host through his company at $10 a month. That's some nice residual income when you multiply it by tens if not hundreds of thousands of jerks, errrr... members. There's nothing new under the sun, just new suckers to make it look so.

These days success is measured almost exclusively by your gross and net. I guess it doesn't much matter if you berate people and hype the living crap out of ancient info to make it look fresh.

When you're a newbie, as I was, everything is fresh. While the ebook wasn't that helpful to me, the forum was a goldmine at that time. Made about $1,000 as a noob from the advice I received from seasoned marketers. Made relationships that I still have today. No one broke anyone's arms to buy the template website or his hosting, and I did not buy it. The RJ Forum, which you got membership into after buying the book was the biggest benefit of buying the book.

[KellyFelix]

Originally Posted by sbucciarel

The RJ Forum, which you got membership into after buying the book was the biggest benefit of buying the book.

Thanks! I hear that a lot actually. The forum became the such an unexpected value for our customers.

I also agree that anti-marketing is somewhat played out now, but being the first has had its advantages. In my opinion the ebook was exactly what you have said - a collection of lots of information that could have been found scattered elsewhere, along with exactly how I used that info to build million dollar info-businesses over and over. And yes, the hosting was huge for us.

I'm finally branching out to my own thing these days, and you can find out more in my signature.

The Warrior Forum has been good to me since 1999. Back then it was just a bulletin board with a core group of cool people. It's amazing how far it has come.

Take care everybody. I'm gonna bow out of this thread and not bump it anymore. I'm pleasantly surprised at how 5 years later these threads still come about.

Best,

Kelly

[Online Bliss]

I appreciate any marketer who can
Dare to Be Different.

The Rich Jerk Started that and at one time
it worked very well for Mr. Kelley Felix.

Originally Posted by discrat

To me I look at it differently. And I think you are taking it waaaayy to personal here.

I see it as a Guy who was smart enough and clever enough and had an incredible imagination and creativity to develop a Persona and ultimately a Brand (which people love to hate) that has literally raked in millions of dollars during a period of a few years.

Pure Marketing genius , plain and simple . Its Branding 101 and something you cant learn at Harvard Business School. You either have it or you dont !!

And this Mother Trucker definitely had it !!

Iam sure a lot of the big time Gurus out there will say things to discredit this guy. Maybe it is out of jealousy because they were incapable of coming up with such true Marketing brillance.

But I think we can ALL learn a great deal from some of the Marketing strategies he used whether you agree with the Rich Jerk premise or not. !!

You Rock Kelly !!
Wow, the Rich Jerk coming on Warrior Forum.......Who would of thought !!

Just remember things are not always as they seem.. To me I do not buy the junk because I do not need it.. I do not take it personally I just happen to do my research and no I would not buy from someone that has lied. Call it hype or marketing or whatever you want to call it. If you got to be fake to make money then I want nothing to do with your business.

There are no gurus... Just people that are good at making you think they are gurus ...

James

[shecky]

I actually met one of the Rich Jerks a few months ago. He's good friends with another marketing buddy of mine. His name is Ryan, and he's a great guy. He's a VERY smart marketer, and does VERY well. He's not really a jerk, that's just his angle....and it works. He definitely wasn't Kelly Felix, so I'm guessing there's a few of these "jerks" running around...lol!

I would agree that the technique probably works best with newbies, but lets face it, with the economy in shambles, there's a TON of newbies always coming into the marketplace looking to make a buck.

Shecky

[lovemyth]

Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill

When a guy tells me he is a jerk, I have no choice but to take him at his word. I wouldn't buy into that obvious gambit, but he's done okay with it from what I've heard.

I think similar approaches would be seen as copycatting and may not work as well for someone else. I also understand he sends emails with the same kind of phony bravado. I'd get tired of that shtick fast, but others are into self-abuse. I guess you could say he's a marketing dominatrix.

"marketing dominatrix"!! haha that's good!! I personally think the jerk is a genious! He really made a name for himself... Goes to show that a little creativeness can go a very long way!!

[danielmcclure]

Yeah I remember coming across his products back in the day. Definitely amusing and caught my sense of humour. Did a bit of research and decided it wasn't for me but there is no doubt that type of marketing can work when done properly.

[discrat]

Originally Posted by TheRichJerksNet

Just remember things are not always as they seem.. To me I do not buy the junk because I do not need it.. I do not take it personally I just happen to do my research and no I would not buy from someone that has lied. Call it hype or marketing or whatever you want to call it. If you got to be fake to make money then I want nothing to do with your business.

There are no gurus... Just people that are good at making you think they are gurus ...

James

Actors in Hollywood do it all the time. They put on a facade and a certain amount of fakeness while potraying someone that they clearly are NOT and boom they get 20 million dollars a film.

This guy was just doing a similar thing using some creativity, imagination and talent to come up with some of those crazy ramblings and enticing people and providing a certain degree of entertainment just like actors !!

By the way, RJ 's blog had some incredibly golden nuggets of information on SEO, PPC and IM in general !!

[juansaldivar]

Well, I think the Rich Jerk site is brilliant from a marketing stand point. People want to hear that, people want to believe that the key to riches is sooo easy everyone can do it. No surprise his ebook is a best seller. From that perspective it is brilliant.

On the other hand, I don't buy it, no get-rich-quick scheme works and I'm not saying that because of experience it's just common sense. However people want to believe it works, so that's the reason they exist.

So in that case, they are just fun to watch their ludicrous claims and see how people "bite" it.

[David McKee]

Well,

I must say I never thought my simple question would generate this much interest - and that in itself is quite constructive. I suspect that if a topic can generate a long thread and a lot of interest on Warriors, then it will also generate traffic on the internet.

The "anti-marketing" aspect of the RJ site points out some interesting things with regard to positioning and trends. RJ sites began back in the more innocent internet era, when the world was not teetering on economic collapse - "everyone" was making a fortune in the "Dot Com" Boom. A certain sense of envy permeated the landscape.

Now, as more people have lost jobs, and we are a bit more skittish with regard to "internet fortunes" I wonder what new strategies in the "anti-marketing" genre would work.

Many thanks to all who have posted their insights to this thread, and of course big thansk goes out to Mr. Kelly Felix, the original.

-DTM

[James12C]

It takes all sorts, doesn't it? Like workouts or training - some people love the bootcamp approach and being shouted at..... I didn't take to his style at all..... but then, my gym membership has lapsed!

[ArnelRicafranca]

I though that it was well done. Absolutely brilliant. He made a fortune from that style of marketing. Why? Because it is different, unique, and unexpected. He was able to separate himself from other so called "expert." The copy was absolutely well done.

[lancasterjoeradio]

Yah I subscribed to Rich Jerk crap for a few weeks. I got pretty fed up with the rich jerks, the black hats, red hats . . . probably the whole babble came from the same jerk alright!

Anyway, I unsubscribed him long ago and thank God I never spent even a wooden nickel on him.

Also Thanks to Tiffany Dow for letting it out the bag today. She sounded pretty upset about it, and I'm proud of having her for a friend and adviser.