Howie's Apprentice 6

I see that Howie Schwartz is launching his latest Apprentice 6 program. Last December, I signed up for Apprentice 5 at a cost of $2,494 and I thought you might be interested in a review of that program.

Just as a bit of background, let me tell you that I am an experienced affiliate marketer and I make a bit of money. Not megabucks, but I'm not a beginner. As a matter of principle I invest a certain amount of my profits into further education so that I can keep up to date in this fast-moving environment.

Howie's sales page (and I kept a copy of it) started out:

"If you have what it takes, if I pick you... you will be in an elite group who has NEVER seen or been a part of my internal, private operation. If you currently have an online business, we'll take it to the next level. If you don't, you'll be 99% ahead of any competition, even if they have years of experience over you..."

From this I presumed that:

1. I would only be admitted to the program if I qualified in some way: that Howie would 'pick' me because I had what it takes
2. I would be in an elite group that would get access to Howie's private operation
3. My current business would be taken to the next level

Throughout the sales page the term 'partner with me' was repeated again and again, implying that this would be a partnership with Howie.

This turned out to be complete garbage.

There was never an 'elite group'. There were weekly webinars where hundreds of people were online. There was no direct contact with Howie: no forum, no opportunity to contact other Apprentices. The majority of the webinars were conducted by 'project managers' who knew less about affiliate marketing than I did and who conducted the events in a haphazard and amateurish way.

The material in the program was laughably basic and there was literally nothing that you could not get for free anywhere on this forum. I really didn't need to spend weeks learning how to create a Squidoo lens.

The tools provided in the program were clunky and ineffective. For example, there was an article submitter where you had to take for ever to set up all the accounts. After eventually managing to submit some articles I could find only one instance of the article actually being published and that had the resource box missing, therefore no link back to my site. To this day, no articles have appeared anywhere else.

I could go on, but it's late where I am. At the end of the program, I had done everything that the course instructed. My sites received little or no traffic and I didn't make a cent. The whole course was a complete waste of time and money.

I have repeatedly asked for a refund but I was told that they had a 'no refund' policy.

I am sadder, wiser and poorer for this experience. If you are thinking of signing up to Howie's Apprentice 6, take my advice and save your money.

Sarah