Jason H. J. Doman Investigative journalist and seasoned marketer; dedicated to the discovery and exposure of online scammers and con artists - Contact Here - Help to 'Alert Others' if you can.

EXPOSED: Ken Ando's "Super Affiliate" Pyramid Scheme Fakes Earnings & Leaves Students Broke


Chapters

Preface

Introduction

PART 1: MEET KEN ANDO

-- Ken & The Nu Skin Pyramid

-- You're Supposed To Fall For It

-- Ken Ando's “Psycho”logy

-- Ken & The MMK Pyramid

-- The Emperor's New Clothes

-- “UNCUT” Coaching Testimonials

PART 2: KEN ANDO'S LIES & DECEPTION

-- LIE #1 – SupAffs & Luxe Cards

-- LIE #2 – Every Weekly Contradiction

-- LIE #3 – His Own Success

-- PROOF A – Digital Products: Clickbank

-- PROOF B – Lead Gen: Transparent Ads

-- PROOF C – Mentoring: Clickfunnels

PART 3: HOW TO TURN $1,000 INTO $32,000

-- Ken's Coaching vs The Roulette Wheel

-- Further Guidance

-- General Advice

-- Offer Selection

-- Ads & Creatives

-- Targeting

-- Testing

-- Scaling

FINAL WORDS

 

PREFACE

Some people consider Ken Ando to be a kind, generous and hard-working individual; a man on mission to improve the world and reward those who help him do it.

Others consider Ken Ando to be a jealous, insecure and paranoid homophobe who’s only out to serve himself; no matter the consequences or what it costs anyone else.

Human nature dictates, most people will make up their minds before reading this article in full.

I would urge you though; whether you are ‘for’ or ‘against’ the content here… read it first and make your judgement after.

Despite my personal feelings on the man and the matter, I’ve done my very best to present objective facts, which give no room to interpretation.

Everything you see and read here is VERIFIABLE.


There’s no way to spin the facts or alter the truth.

If you had your suspicions about him, you’ll have your justification.

If you believe this to be nothing more than negative propaganda; the proof against would be easy enough to acquire from the man himself.

If you find yourself in a difficult position of simply not wanting any of this to be true… just ask yourself:

Can you relate to the single statement almost everyone said to me:
“I had a feeling about him, but I ignored it”

… and can you honestly say you trust him with your future?

Please remember; although disappointing – there is still hope – guidance and advice have been included at the end.

NOTE: All I ask in return – If you find value in doing so; please “Alert Others” and share on Facebook, Twitter or any other media you can.

 

INTRODUCTION

In recent months I was alerted to a ‘new kid on the block’, apparently taking the affiliate marketing world by storm.

Claims of producing Mentors and Super Affiliates within months of starting in the business, going from $0 to $2,000,000/mo (with $1,600,000 being profit) and several other wild claims drew the suspicion of many.


It turns out those suspicions were correct – but barely scratched the surface.

Over the next few months, I examined every word and statement I could find, interviewed current and ex-students and reviewed as much video footage as I could acquire.

Note: It was surprisingly easy to get even members of his “inner circle” to open up, since most of them seem to just be along for the ride – with each of them having lost a substantial amount of money under his tutelage.

What you’re about to read is the collective experience of about two dozen people I can name (which I won’t) and even quote (which I will).

 

PART 1: MEET KEN ANDO

Ken Ando (born “Ali Sadri”) is a 53-year-old Iranian, who emigrated to Japan in his teens to become a martial arts champion. Or so the story goes.


When first meeting him, you’ll likely find him charming and likeable.

With his bleached white smile and slight lisp – you get the impression he’s a slightly goofy, very generous, kind-hearted and fun-loving guy.

Harmless.

And completely disarming.

While reportedly having built (and bankrupted) several businesses in his career so far; he is no fool and has a wealth of experience.

If he did business in the 70’s – he would have been a used car salesman.

But since he operated in the 90’s – he became a Network Marketer.

 

KEN & THE NU SKIN PYRAMID


Network marketing, Multi-level marketing (MLM), Pyramid selling.

This is the first red flag to most – and an important one.

Of the 350 MLMs I have analyzed for which a complete compensation plan was available, 100% of them are recruitment-driven and top-weighted. In other words, the vast majority of commissions paid by MLM companies go to a tiny percentage of TOPPs (top-of-the-pyramid promoters) at the expense of a revolving door of recruits, 99% of whom lose money.
Source: https://www.ftc.gov

Here is why that’s such critical information…

The reason most people associate this type of business with a ‘scam’ is because while everyone gets sold the dream, only a few make money.

Those who typically succeed aren’t selling products.

They are recruiting.

Ken Ando talks loudly about being part of that Top 1% as a Blue Diamond Executive.

Ken used to brag about making more than $100,000 per month and having a network of tens of thousands of people across Asia for “Nu Skin”.

Although I’m sure he’s exaggerating on some things, mostly I believe it, as you can see him using the same manipulation tactics now.

He went on to tell a story about someone who lost $2,000 under him; and he told us what he said to him... “Did I TELL you to spend $2,000?”

He was smiling like he was gloating… pretty disturbing since he later started saying the same about his students. Except the answer there is ‘Yes’.

Source: Ken's Student #1

The most successful pyramid sellers borrow the same recruitment tactics as cults (such as ‘us vs. them’, ‘isolation’, ‘crowd puppetry’).

Expert manipulators, they’re extremely comfortable using people as pawns.


The Top 1% don’t make their money doing what they’re encouraging others to do… they make money convincing you it’s possible.

 

YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO FALL FOR IT


Before we get into the specific lies and schemes Ken Ando has inflicted on the people who trust him… it feels important to first explain how and why.

As in “Why would someone do this?” and “How could someone do this?”

As well as how and why someone would potentially ‘fall’ for it.

When I was first made aware of what was happening and started interviewing people in his close circle – one theme kept repeating:

“It all seemed fine at first”

“I feel foolish for believing him”

“I had a feeling about him, but I ignored it”

I often sensed some element of shame when they spoke about it.

Perhaps because we tend to look at people who ‘fall’ for cons and scam as stupid, weak and naïve…

Foolish victims who could’ve avoided it, if only they were smarter, or had street smarts, or more life experience.

The same way we perceive victims of psychopaths and cult leaders; telling ourselves “I’d never fall for that”.


What people don’t tend to realize is; nobody sees a snake in the grass unless they’re looking for one, or they get bitten.

To be constantly suspicious of everyone may be considered overly cynical, or even paranoid.

For example, when you ask somebody their name and they tell you it’s Alex, you’d likely have no good reason to doubt them.

A healthy, well-adjusted person is polite enough to give someone the benefit of the doubt and won’t call out every contradiction they find.

A healthy, well-adjusted person doesn’t tend to intentionally lie about important things, to serve themselves.

A healthy, well-adjusted person expects everyone else to follow basically the same set of morals, principles and social rules as they do.

And therein lays the rub.


A manipulator doesn’t follow the same rules… they cast them aside and use them against you.

Before you’ve been bitten; it seems rude to challenge someone’s honesty.

After you’ve been bitten; you trust your senses.

 

KEN ANDO’S “PSYCHO”LOGY

There’s no strategic way to say this, as I know it runs the risk of seeming like exaggeration or sensationalism, but…

All evidence suggests Ken Ando is a clinical psychopath.

Quickly watch this short clip of a lecture on Narcissistic Psychopaths.

Because those who worked closely with Ken say “That’s Exactly It!”


This doesn’t mean he eats people, obviously.

It is more to do with having no regard for the wellbeing of people he can use as pawns.

Which means You and I.


This simple element alone would answer “Why would he do this? How could he do this?”

Because it simply wouldn't bother him. He can still sleep at night. He doesn't suffer from a guilty conscience.

The bigger question is… how does he plan on doing it and what must you watch out for?

 

KEN & THE MMK PYRAMID

The idea you’re about to see is inspired.

There is no doubt Ken Ando has serious business chops.

He started out as a ‘humble’ student, who, new to the game, claimed to generate great success in affiliate marketing (lead generation, especially).

He graduated to ‘Mentor’ position within the training company he was coached by… he reignited a silent community, with new weekly sessions.

He gained a following, inspired people and shared some interesting ideas.

He started taking private students (on the side, in secret) and built around him a close circle of supporters, who would praise him in public.

He took one quarter of the original training community into his own brand.


He had everything he needed to build an empire (so it seemed).

And truthfully, if done right, this vision could have been one of the most successful enterprises to occur in the digital marketing world, ever.

Done wrong, it becomes just another pyramid scheme with a small handful of winners and a multitude of losers.

Here is the plan laid out by one of his inner circle:

Ken’s told us his plan is to have, let’s say 5,000 students, each doing an average of $500/day in sales…

We’ve spent countless hours at crazy hours of the night, watching him tap these figures out on a calculator, so we all probably know it by heart now.

The idea is to work out a deal with the networks or vendors to get 5% of the sales, with 90% going to the students and 5% left for the vendor.

It’s good for the vendor because they get a paying customer for free, who they can sell things to later.

It’s good for the students because they get paid more for the sales they make (in theory).

It’s good for Ken because he gets a cut from 5,000 people’s sales, without risking his own money on ads.

5,000 x $500/day is $ 2,500,000 in sales…

5% of that is $125,000…

In one year, that’s $45,625,000.

Source: Ken's Student #2

In theory, this business model is amazing and a win for everybody involved.

In practice, it is a dark and different story, as told by one of his Mentors:

Most of the current Mentors started out in a mastermind because we were all being coached by him, I think.

Ken got a deal in place with the vendor of Water Freedom System and Backyard Miracle Farm.

Not sure why Ken keeps calling it “Water Freedom Solution”.

Anyway, the vendor seems like a good guy – I didn’t really like it when Ken started bragging about ‘making them his bitch’… but whatever. There are a lot of things you learn to ignore.

The idea was we’d all work on the offer, share what’s working and make money with a custom domain and a better payout.

It sounds good until you find yourself at a 30-50% loss every day.

I didn’t realize he was getting a cut of the sales at the time, but it makes sense now, why he kept pushing us to spend more.

Even though we all seemed to be losing money.

Source: Ken's Student #3

So, Ken profits whether his students profit or not.

This presents a huge conflict of interest.

Especially when he relies on his Mentors to do the coaching for him; and when those Mentors are former students who all lost money under him.

Ken has been plucking students and making them Mentors whether they make a profit or not.

He needs to build a team around him and show he’s so good, he can brag about ‘making mentors’.

He tells them how rich he’s going to make them, and most of us believed in him for a while.

So he now has a bunch of people on the hook, many in debt, desperate for money, not knowing how to make money themselves.

And look, I don’t blame them. He’s been manipulating them from the start. They’re good guys.

Some of them were actually pretty good before, but they’re being forced to teach ‘Ken’s Method’.

He’s told a story a few times of when he ran language schools and one of his teachers tried to teach another way and he yelled at them until the guy apologized.

One of the Mentors told me last week, Ken actually asked them: “How many students do you need to get out of debt?”

What the hell kind of person does that?

He doesn’t see the issue with getting paid to mentor people in affiliate marketing, to make up for their affiliate marketing losses?!

Source: Ken's Student #4

Unfortunately, instead of working on delivering what his students really needed; he focused on building ‘just another pyramid’ instead.

Those who suffered under his private mentorship, while it was open, can testify to this.

 

THE EMPEROR'S NEW CLOTHES


While Ken no longer coaches people one to one, as he is ‘too busy’ and focused on his new “Mentor Me Ken” group…

You might be interested to know what happened to the people who paid for mentorship, originally (legitimately or shadily on the side).

To find out, I asked people who were part of Ken’s “Higher Intent” group (including a couple of current Mentors).

NOTE: The “Higher Intent” group was a private coaching group Ken set up on the side and in secret, so he wouldn’t have to split with the training company he was associated with at the time, the thousands of dollars he was charging.

The experiences all echo a real life accounting a folktale written by Hans Christian Anderson; "The Emperor's New Clothes";

Except in this case, we have a single man playing both "The Fool Emperor" AND "The Swindlers"

Here are the accounts of their experience with Ken’s private coaching:

 

“UNCUT” COACHING TESTIMONIALS


There were about 20 of us… he tried to bring in more experienced affiliates but none of them stuck around.

Some of us were new, at beginner-level.

Some of us had success prior to working with Ken and wanted to reach the next level. I was one of those.

We knew it was a little shady we were being told ‘this is a secret’ and ‘don’t tell anyone’.

But we wanted to reach the same kind of success he said he had, so we kept quiet.

It started out ok, with basic business advice, ‘know your numbers’ and ‘test a lot’ and ‘review the course you paid for’.

But while we were all running this offer he’d arranged for us (which was cool, higher payout, private domain), it seemed like we were being given different advice every week.

One week it was “you have to Phase 1, then it’s Phase 2, then it’s Phase 3, then it’s Pre-scaling, then it’s Scaling…”

But he didn’t seem to be able to explain what each one meant, or how they were different.

The next week it was “you have to do 1-3-9 campaigns, and if you set it up right, you’ll make money.”

Ken actually took control of one guy’s account and set it up himself – and it didn’t make money.

He blamed the guy’s ad account.

The next week he told us all to read a pirated copy of a CBO book.

That’s where I realized he stole all his fishing metaphors and ‘Phase 1, 2, 3’ from… except he added too many phases.

The next week he said “I always use CBO for testing and ABO for scaling…”

Except, one of the other guys in the group, who was like Ken’s right hand man for a while before he left – explained to me…

1. CBO is for allocating spend to ad sets based on their performance on the day… so you only want to run it with winners. That way if one has a bad day that day, but another is having a good day, it allocates budget accordingly.

2. You need to be spending a lot for CBO to work well, and just to get an ad set out of the learning phase we’re looking at about $1,500 per ad set per week (50x purchases @ $30)

3. That’s assuming CBO works that well at all… advertisers kept complaining to Facebook that it wasn’t improving their performance, so Facebook rolled back the ‘mandatory switch’… I’m not sure he realizes that, but he should.

So with his whole coaching apparently a bad retelling of that book – on top of getting something SO WRONG when it’s SO BASIC – makes me doubt he’s running anything himself.

Yeah I lost a few thousand before I gave up.

Source: Ken's Student #2



I was making some good money before I started working with Ken, but I could never scale.

Ken was apparently doing thousands a day with great success, so I paid him for coaching.

I wanted to work on the offer I already had running, but Ken convinced me to work on this other offer.

I didn’t really like it, but I trusted him.

I couldn’t get it to work and over about 1-2 months I lost about $10,000. So I stopped until I could get more money together.

When I found out Ken was getting a share of my sales, it made me really angry…

He knew I was losing money every day – but when I cut back on my spend to save money, he kept pushing me to spend more.

He kept coming up with these ideas and tricks that never worked.

By the end I lost all the profit I’d made before and still had no idea how to scale.

Source: Ken's Student #4



He used to have us on a call for hours at a time, repeat the same stories and big-note himself over and over.

Everyone was forced to smile and laugh otherwise it was awkward.

We had about a dozen people, all losing money, nobody knowing what the hell they were doing.

You’d think a bloke who claimed to do hundreds of thousands a month would be able to spot the issue.

Source: Ken's Student #5



Yeah, it wasn’t great… I ended up having to figure everything out myself anyway before I could make any money.

There was some good advice at the start, about cash flow and stuff… but when it came to actually running campaigns, no.

The trouble as I see it, was Ken was trying to build a company, not coach students.

So he’d have you pumping the numbers, getting sales at a big loss, just to hit that magical ‘$1k/day’.

Then he’d have everyone talking in the group about how great he is an how you owe everything to him.

When you’re ‘inside’ it seems ok to do, you’re just helping a friend out… it’s easy enough to switch your conscience off.

Then he’d make false statement about you and your success in public, which is uncomfortable too, but you go along with it.

I don’t know. It all feels a bit cult-like.

The calls go on for too long and he’s just talking about himself and how rich he’s going to make us.

Some of us thought he was BS’ing about his numbers and skills.

Anybody who pointed out when he contradicted him would get poison spat at them… and the next week you’d see the guy had been kicked out of the group for some pathetic reason.

He’s then go about bad-mouthing them, inferring they were gay (like that was something bad), or stupid because of their religion, or weak with no self-confidence, or just backstabbers.

So nobody talked up, because everyone believed if they held on long enough ‘something’ might happen.

He’d start telling people’s personal business in front of the whole group! They told him things in private and trusted him.

He’d spend hours bitching and moaning about someone who’d pissed him off or said something bad about him that week.

And he was clearly ripping off information from other groups and coaches – also given to him in private.

Source: Ken's Student #6



We talked once about all the ways 'gurus' and underhand marketers play tricks on people to get their money...

And while he sat shaking his head at how terrible it is to cheat people like that...

I think he was actually using it as inspiration for what he could do next... as we would come to see in the following weeks.

1) He was taking a cut of people’s sales without telling anyone

2) He was forcing people to sign up (or worse, re-sign up) under his own affiliate links to get commissions

3) He was demanding people buy courses through his link they didn’t ask for, to ‘prove themselves’.

4) He’s fostering a culture of desperation, taking people's power and confidence away as he abuses his position of trust and authority to keep them spending.

5) Bragging about building a ‘CULT-ure’ (he actually said that)

6) He charged us about $200 per month to be part of his ‘inner circle’ where he ended up just showing us motivational videos and ‘mindset’ stuff – he said it was going to charity but I doubt it… we only saw proof one month out of the several.

Source: Ken's Student #7



Don’t want to talk about it, but when he was sharing his screen, I’d keep seeing a Pornhub bookmark in his favorites folder.

Source: Ken's Student #8


Those were a few of the private comments transcribed from the conversations I've had.

Obviously, they could just be made up though – and that's a question you really should be asking!

So here are other public comments to view elsewhere.

If you're closely involved, you'll know where to find most of them for your own verification (just search the group).

Some have been taken down as 'The Ken Situation' was still emerging, but some still remain.

It's also worth seeing what people said about Ken in the early days.

Ask yourself what might make numerous people change their opinion about someone so passionately?




I’ve heard Ken discount complaints like this as people who failed, who are looking for someone to blame.

He has a habit of talking people up all the time he needs something from them; and immediately turning on them when he’s done with them.

However, what you’ll find is most people only start making money after they stopped listening to Ken and distanced themselves from him.

You can find their posts if you know where to look.

So, if you’re considering being coached by Ken, this concludes the section on his plans for your future – and what you can expect.

But as I said before, we’re only scratching the surface.

 

PART 2: KEN ANDO'S LIES & DECEPTION

Before I started writing this piece, I had to ask myself a question.

“Does he mean well?”

I always consider somebody’s intention when judging their actions.

Maybe... due to his unique upbringing, or experience in network marketing, he simply thinks this is what it takes to get ahead.

Maybe... he really is trying to make everyone rich.

Maybe... his knowledge is yet to catch up to his aspirations… so he’s trying to give a ‘good enough’ education, while he works on his infrastructure.

Maybe... later on, he’ll bring in real experts (if he can share the spotlight) and real coaches, with real success and profits.

Maybe... it’s better to encourage people into action, so they can get the experience to figure things out for themselves.


But then I realized… I’m making excuses for him. Because generally speaking, I’m a healthy and well-adjusted person.

And I didn’t want to have the burden of ruining a man’s career on my shoulders, in case I got it wrong.

I had to be sure.

And so, I reflected on the three biggest lies we can absolutely prove (or which he could easily disprove).

It seems for the most part, the only evidence anyway has been given is “Because Ken said so”.

But when somebody has been proven to be a bare-faced liar… is ‘their word’ really good enough?

 

LIE #1 – SUPAFFS & LUXE CARDS


It’s difficult to keep track of exactly what Ken has stated publicly about these two entities.

Supaffs.com (short for ‘Super Affiliates’ but he apparently couldn’t get that domain, which in turn is short for “Super Affiliates Never Farm”)

To begin with, SupAffs was presented as ‘a great resource only Super Affiliates use’ to get working Facebook accounts.

He may now have admitted to owning the website, or perhaps he pretends to have ‘bought it’, after several students noticed the PayPal payments were going straight to his company ‘Aria Brand’ before he changed it.

In actual fact, the website is simply a white label version of dont.farm.

This means, it’s the same service with a new design and a $100 mark up.

Here is proof at time of writing (he will likely get this fixed):


It's a bit technical; but essentially this shows SupAffs is built on Dont.Farm and the 'clean up' wasn't as thorough as he would have liked.

Oh, and here's the old Dont.Farm dashboard a.k.a. what you see at the end of that video.


And for the extra detail oriented and/or technical – the server stored favicon, before it got changed.


Why is this such a problem?

Because it proves how little concern he has, for the people who trust and spend money with him.

You see, Ken immediately set about creating a culture of fear around ad accounts and getting banned.

To begin with, he claimed the #1 issue facing affiliates is that their accounts will keep getting shut down – and eventually their users will get banned.

While there’s an element of truth to this; as with most of what Ken says, there’s a stronger element of exaggeration.

And it really isn’t worth thinking about when you’re yet to master the fundamentals of bringing a campaign to profit.

You’d think more time would be spent on that, than RDPs.

When fear wasn’t enough – he started mandating everybody should be running on at least 3-5 accounts, for scale.

That’s enough to cover a $15,000 to $25,000 daily spend.

Again, to people still trying to make their first $100/day profit.

“You have accounts that are like silk handkerchiefs. You look after them, wash them, fold them… you don’t throw them away. Those are your personal accounts. Then you have tissues, you use, screw up and throw away. Those are your RDP accounts”

Source: Ken Ando - Mentor Me Ken Live Call, June 2020

Someone who has your best interest at heart, isn’t likely to have you paying $200-$400 for accounts you may not need, before you’re in profit.

Nor would they recommend something that eliminates any chance you’ll be able to run a campaign successfully for the long-term.

Nor would they charge you a $100 mark up for the privilege.

While he says “get accounts any way you can, I don’t care… I use RDPs, every super affiliate I know uses RDPs, they are better”

As a master of framing dynamics, he knows while his words say “I don’t care”, his non-verbals say “You are stupid if you don’t buy RDPs”.

And when you have so many people trusting you, you know your recommendation carries weight.

It’s an abuse of trust so extensive – the ethical issue of using the accounts in the first place, scarcely seems worth mentioning.


Luxe Cards is a payment service providing US-based payment cards.

This one is simple.

He claimed to be a 50% owner of the business now, which is why he can offer you a special deal.

That’s easy enough to verify – just ask them.

In reality, he has a special type of accounts that allows him to create sub-accounts.

He pays $1,200 per month and a 3% loading fee.

He charges you $20 per month and a 5% loading fee ($1,000 minimum).

To be fair, this is a good deal for people who cannot get access to reliable payment methods elsewhere.

So why lie about the ownership?

It would be baffling – if it weren’t his track record to make outrageous claims to present himself as a much bigger deal than he really is.

We’ll discuss why that is momentarily.

 

LIE #2 – EVERY WEEKLY CONTRADICTION


Ken built his reputation spilling the secrets of Super Affiliates who believed in him, trusted him and shared with him.

He developed a kind of “Robin Hood” persona.

It did not seem to matter to Ken, the guys who shared these secrets with him, did so in confidence and secrecy.

They had spent A LOT of time and money to discover them.

It’s the same for students.

I discovered a method myself, which I was really excited about.

I shared it with Ken because we were working closely together.

I asked him “please keep this between us” and he said “of course, everything is between us, we’re family”.

That evening he shared it with a group of about a dozen people, as though it was his own invention.

Source: Ken's Student #6

Anybody who’s worked with Ken Ando for long enough will have noticed some inconsistencies.

Method A is the best thing one week, Method B is best the next week and Method A doesn’t really work anymore.

Person A is the greatest person he’s ever met one week, but the next week Person A is dirt and he never really meant what he said anyway.

Tool A is garbage one week and a waste of your time and money, but the next week Tool A is an absolute must-have – now he has an affiliate link.


Perhaps the reason for it is simple.

He says whatever it takes to get what he wants; and relies on most people being too polite to call him out on it.

Beyond question, Ken steals and badly misinterpreted the methods of successful affiliates and passed them off as his own.

I watched Ken try to show off one day, talking about this clever trick he knows, to someone in the group…

Unfortunately for Ken, he forgot the person he’s bragging to – was the person who taught him that trick in the first place.

Source: Ken's Student #4

That he fails to understand the principles behind them doesn’t matter – he only needs you to believe it works, he doesn’t need it to actually work.

That he misremembers what he said last week, doesn’t matter if he can distract you with something shiny and new this week.

For example, he once complained at length about how ‘fake gurus’ and ‘fake mentors’ abuse their students by making them buy products through their affiliate links when they don’t need them…

He said how disgusting it was, as he shook his head.

He then dedicated many hours of ‘free’ training sessions to certain new ‘must have’ trick, which coincidentally ends with an affiliate promotion.

In recent weeks he’s encouraged students to use his affiliate links for:

-- Bluehost - $30/mo

-- ClickFunnels - $97/mo

-- Social Ad Scout - $127/mo

-- AdSpy - $149/mo (because $127/mo wasn't already enough)

-- Interest Explorer - $97 One Time

-- TransferWise - No Monthly Fee

-- Juni - TBD & Untested

-- GrooveFunnels - Varies Depending On What Tier You Buy

-- RedTrack - $41/mo (a complicated tool no beginner could possibly need)

That’s obviously not counting the continuous promotion of his own schemes, which he never forgets to include.


There was also one more item certain students were 'encouraged' to buy.


-- Simple WiFi Profits - $1,497 One Time

NOTE: This last one was another cult recruitment tactic; framed as a 'test' for certain students to 'prove themselves'. Basically if you bought something just because he said so, without explanation, he knew he 'had you'. You'd get invited into his 'inner circle'. Incidentally, he would later bad mouth that same course he demanded people pay $1,497 for on his command to big himself up. Classy.

And in case you still have it in mind Ken is doing this to help or be generous, look what happens when someone follows his lead and posts a link too...

Well...


 

LIE #3 – HIS OWN SUCCESS

I’ve tried to write this piece with some element of entertainment.

Not to make light of things – but to make it at least somewhat readable.

But this is perhaps the most vicious lie he’s told of all, because it laid the foundation for every betrayal that would follow.

So take a deep breath before you start reading.

The man claims to now make $2,000,000 per month at a $1,600,000 profit.

I don't have proof of him making this claim precisely, though some may remember. We do have this though...


He doesn’t say exactly how, but he allows you to believe it’s from affiliate marketing and media buying.

Inside sources tell me his ‘Media Buying’ team is yet to turn a dollar profit and they keep getting their RDP accounts shut down.

So as for the rest… we’re going to ask “The Banned Question”

Where is the proof?


Ken may have proof... I mean, he doesn't... but for argument's sake, let's say he may have proof.

In actual fact, he could very easily falsify proof.

Images are easy to edit (as he’s encouraged students to do in the past, to ‘accelerate’ their success and his own social proof).

Videos are harder, but still possible.

Web pages can be altered on the fly in a live stream with Google Chrome’s Developer Tools feature.

He doesn’t do that… which is a credit to him.

But not so much credit it discounts the fact, he’s never shown anyone any evidence of his $1,600,000 monthly profits.

To my count, there are three main areas he's claimed to have huge success in. Three areas he should be able to provide proof upon request.

 

PROOF A – DIGITAL PRODUCTS: CLICKBANK

Considering he coaches people to run campaigns for Clickbank products and has vendors begging him to partner up… you might think he’s run some profitable Clickbank campaigns himself.

And you'd be right. He has.

Despite what he claims; it is NOT rude to ask for this kind of proof, when you’re being asked to pay him hundreds or thousands of dollars.

Nor is it rude, when you know the #1 factor people need in a coach is trust and honesty – and you’re in a business known for being dirty and deceptive.

Nor is it rude, when you know most of the people you’re coaching have been burned before – and you’ve criticized all the other ‘fakes’.

Nor is it rude, when you know he had no problem doing it before – and actually seemed to enjoy it... (click for larger image).


So what changed?

And where was that $5,000 day?

How about the $10,000 day he can teach you all about "when you're ready"?

How about the $60,000 days he's enjoying now?

CLEARLY he knows the value of sharing proof... it's what got him into a Mentorship position in the first place.

This article was never meant to make the case he never made sales.

Only that he lies – and his experience is not much greater than your own.

But ask the vendors of Power Efficiency Guide, EZ Battery Reconditioning, Backyard Revolution and Ted's Woodworking.

They'll tell you if Ken's one of their top affiliates or not.

 

PROOF B – LEAD GEN: TRANSPARENT ADS


Ken claimed his major success came from Lead Generation, at a time he was working with Transparent Ads.

Again, you contact them and see what they have to say about him.

In the early days, students were shown his “EDU” campaigns (lead generation for college degree services).

He bragged about how his campaigns were shut down because his conversion rates were so high, the advertiser thought he went ‘Black Hat’.

Except there’s some context missing…

When Ken first started talking to us about Lead Generation, he would show us inside his Transparent Ads account.

The idea was to show off his conversion rates.

At one point it was 75%, which is seriously impressive.

Except later on, it was 33% and so the number of leads and how ‘strangely’ round those numbers were (three quarters, one third) made me suspicious.

It’s very possible he went from 3 leads out of 4 converted on a good day… to 3 leads out of 9 the next.

Still a good conversion rate, but not what he presented it as… and not consistent.

I also remember Transparent Ads didn’t let you place the pixel with the advertiser; you could only place it on your lander.

So his “$6 per lead” weren’t actually paid leads, they were just clicks to the actual offer page.

Even at 33% conversion rate it’s $15 per lead, which is solid for a $30 payout.

None of this was as suspicious as his YTD earnings on that account being around $14,000 though.

That network also had a cap of about 80-100 leads per month, which he kept complaining about. Maybe he got a boost.

But even if he got double that, you’re still talking just $6,000 per month in revenue.

So overall, it seems Ken’s big Lead Gen success made him about $7,000 profit if we’re being generous… not quite as ‘Super Affiliate’ as he makes out.

Source: Ken's Student #2

After what’s likely a response to the “show your numbers” pressure, Ken recently shared inside his lead gen ad account (click for larger image).


If you look closely, you’ll see a $2,078.42 lifetime spend to get 509 ‘leads’.


His ads received a 0.64% click through rate on average… but at a cost of $4.08 per lead and $1.04 per click, those are good numbers!

Even lower than the $6 per lead he had when showing earlier students during the same period.

So… do they tell the whole story?

Did he show the earnings from his network account to give an idea of profitability?

And where are all the ad sets for the ‘hundreds of interests’ he tested before, like “Chris Rock”… before finding “Saved By The Dress”…?

Did he delete them, thereby removing all the ad sets pushing his ad spend and cost per lead up – and his profits down?

Consider he’s plainly lied about capping out an offer with a network who’s discounted his performance altogether… ‘possible’ becomes sadly probable.

But ask the networks he claims to be involved with.

They'll tell you if Ken's one of their top affiliates or not.

 

PROOF C – MENTORING: CLICKFUNNELS

WARNING

This is perhaps the most despicable of all.

To open the doors into the networks he needed to get into, to discover the secrets he would later hand out for free… he needed to ‘prove himself’.

How did he do it?

He showed off the quarter of a million dollars he’d been paid for “Mentoring Alone” through his Clickfunels account (click for larger image).

Check it out…


Once again, if you look a little bit closely…

To the top right, you’ll see him logged in as his SupAffs user, which is a point we've moved on from, but still..


To the top left, you’ll see the account belonging to ‘bzmatrix’ (one of Ken’s entities) in the URL bar.


And to the lower left, you’ll see payments of $10,000 and $20,000 being received by the account from ‘[email protected]’.


What logic can we apply here?

Perhaps that Ken is funneling money from his own accounts to inflate his numbers and buy the proof he needs?

He’s asked students to do the same, no reason to think he wouldn’t do the same himself.

Even taking a 3% hit from the payment processor, a few thousand dollars to buy $250,000 of proof is worth it to a man who goes by reputation alone.

Indeed, Ken was getting paid for Private Mentoring (in secret, on the side) despite guiding his students almost invariably to $10,000 losses.

 

PART 3: HOW TO TURN $1,000 INTO $32,000

It is entirely possible in this business, to turn $1,000 into $32,000 and much more, over time.

But before you can do that, you have to be able to turn a campaign consistently profitable by mastering the fundamentals.

The truth is, you don't run a campaign any differently at $10,000/day than you do at $100/day.


You simply spend more, and do more, with the same proven systems and processes you've developed or acquired yourself.

Huge advertising and marketing agencies don't have armies of super affiliates working for them. They have interns and VA's.

Take a brief look at how eCommerce companies do their media buying and you'll see how simple it is.

If it really required any of the 'magic, mystery and trickery' Ken (and others like him) pretend; Facebook would go bankrupt because nobody could profit using their platform.


And while he keeps talking about these completely arbitrary revenue or profit levels (depending on how he feels that day)…

$1k/day… $5k/day… $10k/day…

It seems certain he’s never hit more than a temporary $1,000/day himself, through his own media buying campaigns.

For a man who's willing to show off ANYTHING and EVERYTHING, it just doesn’t add up he’d be so secretive about his own campaign successes.

He urges students to post any success or milestone they hit AS they hit it, which is for sure encouraging to others.

What's perhaps less encouraging (downright disheartening) is nobody appears to have maintained a profit outside of these random events.

Perhaps because they haven't been provided that education or advice.

Perhaps because Ken doesn't have that knowledge himself.

And if that were the case... perhaps he doesn't deserve any more of your time, attention or money.

 

KEN'S COACHING VS THE ROULETTE WHEEL


So far, based on the significant feedback I received from the "Mentor Me Ken" and "Higher Intent" coaching groups...

The MOST GENEROUS estimate gives Ken's training a success rate of ~2-3 out of 150... or about 2%.

That's a far cry from the 100% success rate he promised, over and over again.

And just to be clear – I really am being generous, since while I'm counting those who were in profit 'for a while'; I don't think it was sustained.

If you went to a casino and placed $1,000 on red, black, even or odd at a roulette table – and if you won 5x spins in a row – you'd have turned your $1,000 into $32,000.

The odds of that happening are approximately 2.1%.

Alternatively. you can place $1,000 on a single number and turn that $1,000 into $36,000 if you win – but it's all or nothing, so it's riskier in that sense.

The odds of that happening are approximately 2.6%.

To put that into perspective...

It means you stand a mathematically better chance of making a profit playing Roulette, than letting Ken Ando coach you in affiliate marketing.

And I don't know anyone who has managed to make $30,000 in profit with affiliate marketing while under Ken's tutelage and guidance.

He leverages his background in network marketing and makes heavy use of cult recruitment manipulation tactics.


He will shower some people with cash and gifts to show his generosity / buy their loyalty, while complaining about how stupid they are in private.

At this point, your mind should be made up.

I am not intending to convince you one way or another.

It is my opinion – and the experience of many others – he is a charlatan and a fraud.

It is my regret – he has betrayed your faith and abused your trust in him.

He tried the excuse for a while:
"You don't have to be a great athlete to be a great coach"

But when you aren't either, what the hell are you charging for?

You now have the truth and the facts he would never provide you.

You can make your own decision.

Just ask yourself…


Do you really trust him?

Do you trust him with your future?

Do you believe he genuinely cares about you?

Do you believe his kindness and generosity aren’t just a calculated show?

Do you believe he has your best interest at heart?

Do you have complete and utter faith in him?

Enough to let him shape your future and financial situation?

Enough to pay him hundreds or thousands of dollars for the privilege?

Does he deserve that from you?

You’ll have your answer.

 

FURTHER GUIDANCE


I don’t like the idea of leaving you without a better option.

And despite Ken’s promise of revealing the ‘hidden methods’ to get you to $1,000/day, $5,000/day or $10,000/day (not that he could…)

There is NO SIGNIFICANCE to those numbers.

There are no ‘hidden methods’ somebody who’s making $10,000/day knows, which somebody making $1,000/day or $5,000/day does not.

It is just a matter of having a single, simple, repeatable system and process, with a good budget and a willingness to multiply your effort.

So, I’ll provide you with what I would do in your position; assuming limited budget but having some time on my side.

 

GENERAL ADVICE


If you’re part of a good affiliate or lead generation network, reach out to them for advice; because they want you to do well.

The best networks run training and Q&A sessions for their affiliates; WITHOUT charging them and WITHOUT pitching them anything.

Then, consume all the material of the courses you currently have.

Make notes and connect the dots.

Where are they similar? Figure out why.

Where are they different? Figure out why.

If you aren’t making money, it’s not likely due to a lack of knowledge.

Read blogs, search for guides on “How to make $100/day with Facebook ads” and study the advice.

Get good at telling the difference between someone who’s legitimately good and someone who just PRETENDS to be good.

Put together a system for yourself that makes sense to you, from A-Z.

Decide how you will test.

Decide how you will scale.

Decide how you will maintain.

Make heavy use of Excel or Google Sheets so you can track the performance of your campaigns.

The more you know, the better you will perform.

Forget about CBO (Campaign Budget Optimization) and focus on using ABO (Ad Set Budget Optimization) from Testing to Scaling.

ABO gives you better, more precise control and will be more than enough to reach $100/day to $1,000/day in profit and beyond.


The guys who understand the business know this.

To write it off as “oh everyone does it differently” is a poor excuse to throw you off the scent.

 

OFFER SELECTION


Look for something that makes sense to you, something you can see people buying. Ideally from a vendor with a good reputation and low refunds.

If you can visualize a person’s journey from seeing the ad, to clicking the ad, to seeing the landing page and eventually buying… it could work.

Reach out to the vendor and ask them about pixel placement and commission bumps, as well as advice who their ideal targets are.

If they are helpful, they are worth working with.

If not, they’re not so move on.

If you can get a buyer’s list, then you can work with Lookalike Audiences right away and simply focus on finding the best ads.

 

ADS & CREATIVES

You can try spying and it can be helpful, but if you can’t, it’s fine.


Search instead for examples of “Best Facebook Ads” and figure out why they work so well.

Scroll your own news feed and see what catches your eye… why does it?

Scroll down YouTube and see what catches your eye… why does it?

Apply it to your product.

Learn to create those kinds of images or find someone who can create them for you (fiverr, or onlinejobs.ph for example).

For written ad copy – try to focus on the biggest benefit and write the ad as though you’re sending a message to a friend.

It’s ok to be informal, you can say ‘lol’ or ‘btw’ and you can use emojis.

It’s a social platform, not a billboard.

 

TARGETING

I actually won’t be able to do as good a job as Paco Vermeulen of Interest Explorer.


So I suggest you read his excellent guide to Interest Targeting here:
https://interestexplorer.io/facebook-interest-targeting/

Interest Explorer, by the way, was a tool Ken once condemned as being a tool for lazy people.

Once he acquired an affiliate link though, his opinion on the tool changed completely.

You will notice that’s NOT an affiliate link – and despite what Ken often says about it being “the business we’re in” (so long as it’s his link, as we saw...)

The fact is, when someone has a financial incentive for you to do something, you can never trust their recommendation in the same way.

That’s why healthy, well-adjusted people feel extremely uncomfortable promoting things to friends.

Why is that? Simple... because when you get paid for something, it's no longer done purely from kindness of your heart.


It stops being generous and instantly becomes instrumental.

We know this already. We feel it. That's why we typically don't do it. Not with friends and family. Unless we give the commission to them.

Anyway, Interest Explorer is a great tool and a huge time saver if used correctly.

And remember; you target Interests to start with so you can feed your pixel data – start with smaller audiences and expand your test into larger ones.

The end goal is to educate the pixel well enough; Facebook can take over and you can use Lookalike Audiences instead (or alongside, if certain interests continue to perform).

 

TESTING

Your budget and cash flow will determine how you test.


There are so many things to test. Some things have a bigger impact than others.

You are always looking to show the right thing to the right people, though.

Your ads and your target audiences will always likely have the biggest impact on your campaign, so you must test both.

But there is a tricky part to all this.

If you have a bad ad, you won’t get much interest no matter who you target.

If you have a bad audience, your ads won’t give you any results.

So, you must decide on what to test first and how.

If you are confident you have a good ad… test audiences.

If you are confident you have a good audience… test ads.

The amount you spend on testing is up to you and your budget.

Just remember, the more you spend, the faster you will get data and the sooner you will be able to optimize.

Just test intelligently and know when enough is enough.

 

SCALING

Your budget and cash flow will determine how you scale.


You can only scale when you have A GOOD AD and A GOOD TARGET.

That means, making money at a low spend ($50 or so).

If you’re making 100% ROI you only need to spend $100 to make $100.

If you’re making 75% ROI you need to spend $133 to make $100.

If you’re making 50% ROI you need to spend $200 to make $100.

If you’re making 25% ROI you need to spend $400 to make $100.

When you see something that potentially works, it is simply a matter of adding more money to it.

You can go conservatively and add 20% to your spend every other day and this will usually make for a longer term promotion.

You can go aggressively and multiply your spend whenever you feel like it and this will simply make things go faster (but it is riskier).

Ultimately, ‘how’ you do it isn’t as important as paying close attention to what happens – and taking action based on your findings.

Gradually spend more money on the ads and targeting that make you money. Allow them one bad day, don’t allow them three.

Obviously, things can get more advanced, but master the fundamentals before getting into more complicated issues.

You need a good ad.

You need a good audience.

You need enough money to buy enough ad space to make sales.



 

FINAL WORDS

This 9,000+ word epic is but a fraction of what I’ve discovered over the past few months; and what dozens have witnessed first-hand.

The rest is largely a closer examination of his manipulation tactics and horror stories of his behavior behind closed doors.

Some of is more akin to schoolyard gossip.


By the time Ken reads this (as he will, as all narcissists do)...

He’ll be forced to comment on it.

He will be held accountable not just by his students, but hopefully, by the Mentors as well – good people who trusted him fully.

He might wave it off and dismiss it, as though it’s “not worth his time”.

He might play the victim “I don’t know why they talk bad about me”

He might frame it as “the bigger you get, the more critics you get”.

He might say “I like it, it motivates me and gives me energy”.

He might even have the gall to say “It's all a lie".


But make no mistake, he OWES YOU an explanation.

Be vigilant, as whatever he says will be expertly crafted, to produce the exact emotion he needs from you to carry on with him.

Be it pity, guilt, excitement, joy or fear.

But put yourself first.

You don't owe him anything.


Also ask yourself...

Can it really be a good thing to have around 80% of the people he’s worked closely with in the past, don’t just ‘not recommend’ him… but actively despise him?

Can it really be a good thing to have training companies, thought leaders and networks kicking him out of their groups and severing ties with him?

Can it really be a good thing, people in his closest inner circle were so eager to tell the truth about what is going on?

Think about it... what would you say to a dear friend who came to you with an article like this, about someone they were involved with?


It’s my sincere hope that if you read this far...

You’ll be saved from the same fate that befell countless others…

From current and ex-students, to the tens of thousands who crossed his path in his past pyramid selling days.

There are no secrets in this business and there’s nothing new under the sun.


You have the right – even the responsibility – to find out the truth.

Demand to see numbers.

Demand to see proof.

They are easy to provide and cause no harm to an honest man.


Entrepreneurs are blessed and cursed.

We understand that in order to have a life most people don’t have; we must do things most people won’t do.

But that's only really supposed to mean getting up early or working like you have a second job for a while, until you make the business work.

It doesn’t extend to ignoring your instincts.

If you're going to stick around to enjoy this as a kind of TV drama unfolding, then do so.

Although one might argue the time could be better spent on your business.

But if you're doing this in the hopes of making a better life for yoursef or your family, you deserve better than this.

In the words of Ronald Reagan;

“Trust… But Verify”

And reach out if you need anything – [email protected]

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