An honest My Online Startup review, including my own results and experience, and a conclusion whether this is scam or a legit online opportunity. My recommendation follows at the bottom of the post.
Name: My Online Startup (Formerly Earn Easy Commissions)
Owner: Chuck Nguyen
Website: myonlinestartup.com
Cost to join: Free
One time Offers: None
Upgrades: Partner Upgrade $200*, Legendary Partner upgrade additional $1000*
Other costs: Paid solo advertising (optional)
Features: Free to join, Fixed income stream funnels, Upgrade inside, pass up commissions, DFY systems
Risk factors: Low (free) – Very High (upgraded)
Ethical score: Average (see detailed discussion below)
* You may have to pay VAT/GST on this amount, due to Clickbank regulations. Getresponse and Clickmagic accounts optional at approximately $15 & $27 per month, but required if you want the DFY Lead Generation System.
What is My Online Startup and how does it work?
The MOS sign up page claims that it provides a “100% Free Education Platform where You Can
Build Your Very Own 6-Figure Online Business”.
The reality is that it is never that easy and not that simple. And though the basic training course is completely free, there are upgrades and tools inside which is required along the way to be successful and earn online. You could do without them but it will take a lot of hard work to get there and there is nothing ‘passive’ about it.
What is covered in the MOS Free Course?
There are over 50 training videos in the free course, so it would be hard to discuss them all in detail. Most of the videos I found enjoyable and informative to watch.
They are professionally done and the content is educational, and truly stands on its own as a free course. This is not one of those ‘free training’ platforms where the content is all about why you should upgrade.
To give you an idea of what is covered, here is the course outline:
Step 1: The Game Plan
1.1 The Game Plan
Step 2: Success Mindset
2.1 Mindset Is Everything
2.2 Strong Personal Why
2.3 Clear Income Goal
2.4 Powerful Self-Image
2.5 Personal Success Formula
2.6 100X More Productive
2.7 My Success Philosophy
Step 3: Affiliate Marketing
3.1 Important Fundamentals
3.2 Most Profitable Niches
3.3 Find Affiliate Products
3.4 Pick Your One Product
3.5 Your Unfair Advantage
Step 4: Lead Generation
4.1 Super Affiliate Formula
4.2 Quality Lead Magnet
4.3 Creating Capture Pages
4.4 Automated Follow Ups
4.5 Track Your Conversions
4.6 Integrating Your System
Step 5: Authority Platform
5.1 Importance Of A Blog
5.2 Building Out Your Site
5.3 Customising Your Blog
5.4 Best Type Of Articles
5.5 Tips & Tricks To Writing
5.6 Blog Post Checklist
5.7 Conclusion
Step 6: YouTube Marketing
6.1 The Power Of YouTube
6.2 Setting Up Channel
6.3 Must Have Resources
6.4 Best Types Of Videos
6.5 Shooting And Editing
6.6 Ranking Your Videos
Step 7: Forum Marketing
7.1 Quality Traffic Source
Step 8: Targeted Solo Ads
8.1 Easiest Traffic Method
8.2 Simple Udimi Network
8.3 Reliable Solo Agency
8.4 Trusted Solo Vendors
At the time of writing, there was a free DFY blog option in the making for free members.
Free members are not able to promote MOS and earn affiliate commissions from upgrades or the various income streams (more about this below).
Even though the training and the DFY blog is free, you will still have to pay for other tools, like hosting.
The sales page can be a bit misleading, the DFY lead generation system is only for upgraded members.
Partner Upgrade – $200
The main benefit of the Partner program is that you get promote MOS and earn affiliate commissions, and the DFY Lead generation system.
As an affiliate, you can earn 50% commissions on free members who upgrade to partner. You can also potentially earn commissions from the other programs called income streams, which includes
- Wealthy Affiliate
- Udimi
- Traffic for Me
- Getresponse
- Click Magick
By adding your affiliate ID’s to your MOS members area, those members referred by you will click on a link with your affiliate ID in them, when they reach that part of the course.
You should note that your ability to earn from these additional income streams will depend on in your upgraded referrals actually using the service or advertising. Or they may already have accounts there, in which case you will not earn from them.
Additional training modules for Partners:
- Module 1 – Preparing Sucess
- Module 2 – 10 x commissions
- Modul3 3 – Facebook Method
The optional DFY lead generation system contains an autoresponder follow up series of over 160 days worth of emails, some of them to give value and other contain promotional emails, including your affiliate link.
Legendary Partner Upgrade – $1,000
I did not opt for this upgrade. Note that is on top of the first $200 you pay for the Partner upgrade. I did learn a few things from the promotional video in the membership area though.
Legendary Partners get to be part of the Inner Circle FB group. During launch Partners was allowed a trial membership of this group. Supposedly there will be some special, additional training available here. During launch there was a 30 days to success training in the group, mostly about prospecting in Facebook. Some more training has been promised but I cannot comment on that.
The big hook for going Legendary is 50% commissions when your partner referrals go Legendary as well, pass up commissions when your partners referrals who did not go Legendary themselves have one off their referrals go Legendary. Unless they are also legendary, in which case you get $100. Confused yet?!
At least that’s what I could make of it. Pass up commissions get complicated very quickly. I still have a smile when I think of a video with Dave Wood from the now bankrupt Empower Network trying to explain the ‘logic’ behind their pass up commission system!
I’m not a huge fan of paying more simply with the hope of earning more in the future, and also when you will get some kind of undefined special training in the future.
My experience and results with My Online Startup
I joined during the launch phase, and decided to try the DFY list building system, since I hear forever that ‘the money is in the list’ and I wanted to try and test it for myself.
I struggled to keep up with the Facebook group in the launch phase. There was lot going on and some things were being changed on the fly. Generally speaking, FB groups can get quite busy and it is easy to miss some things. It did help that the 30 days challenge was done in Units, so I could at keep with that part.
I followed the Facebook training. I decided to create a new FB account to protect my friends and family from scammers and trolls, since this method requires you to join opportunity seeking groups and identify ‘buyer’ prospects to add as friends. Honestly, I have to admit I found prospecting on FB quite frustrating and it was a steep learning curve. However, I do appreciate that Chuck put that out there for members who did not want to spend on advertising or go down the list building route.
O also tried to build up my profile by networking with other MOS partners. The idea is that support one another by liking each others posts and/or commenting. That sometimes backfired when some of them copied my techniques and what I was doing in some FB groups.
I tried some paid advertising from the MOS training, specifically solo ads. I had some good results with list sign ups and the free membership converted well. As a result, I managed to referred over 170 free members into MOS.
Impressive as that might sound, to date I have not earned a single commission from this, no upgrades and nothing from the income streams. So the adverting dollars spent turned out to be high risk. I stuck to Chuck’s training and followed up via email on all my free referrals, but still with no result.
From what I learned in the MOS FB group, nobody was producing any results from solo ads. I used Udimi and followed a specific strategy to identify buyers, so I know it was not purely due me not using Udimi properly. That being said, I doubt I would use them after this experience.
To my surprise, one of the top MOS affiliates admitted to never making any sales from Traffic for Me, the other recommended solo ad provider and much moire expensive than Udimi.
Clearly, if you want short term success with MOS you will have to follow to FB training, prospect hard and follow up a lot.
However, the way the system works, there is always a chance that someone may upgrade later or use one the products in the revenue streams.
I did follow the 30 days to success training and followed up using the email addresses provided for my referrals. I suspect that a lot of them used a non-primary address because they have been singing up for too many things, a risk that you always face when using solo ads to advertise to someone else list.
So for me, the statement that you can earn a passive income just by giving away a free course did not turn out to be true.
Pros – What I liked
- The training is high quality and completely free. I learned a lot just from going through all the videos.
- Unlike most other products today, you will not be bombarded with One Time Offers and Upsells once you log into your membership area.
- The DFY Lead Generation system linked to Clickmagick must have taken a lot of hard work from Chuck’s team. I would definitely have taken a couple weeks to figure that out myself and made many errors along the way
- The support team responded to my questions swiftly when I needed help
- When I reached out on the FB group with an issue on the Clickmagick training, Chick responded to it personally and showed me how to correct it.
- Chuck never pushes you to upgrade or do anything unless you understand what you are doing. He has no problems saying that My Online Startup is not for everyone
- I learned a lot from Chuck’s stories about his journey to becoming an entrepreneur, especially overcoming his fear, doubt and rejection
- I believe it is a good concept to give away a complete and quality produced course for free, which proves that you are willing to add value before expecting someone to buy from you
- I learned important lessons on tracking, specifically the quality of traffic, by using the Clickmagick free trial.
- I got a bit lost in my new Getrepsonse account initially, but Chucks training is very focused and as a result I used his training more in the begging than the actual training available on Getresponse
Cons – What I didn’t like
- There was a lot of hype during the launch, especially in the Facebook groups, with members constantly posting screenshots of their Clickbank earnings and receiving congratulations from other members These were from seasoned marketers though. One of the top affiliates posting his sales regularly has about FB 5,000 friends. His MOS upgrade conversion rate is 10%. These success posts encourage many other members to join and upgrade, hoping to achieve the same results in a short period.
- Most of the training provided in the Inner Circle Facebook group was about prospecting and closing sales via Facebook. This is very labour-intensive work if you don’t have a FB profile set up for this purpose and with a huge following. It also potentially exposes you to a lot of FB scammers.
- The partner upgrades are paid via Clickbank. Although this provides some extra protection, if you are not in the US you could pay VAT or Sales tax, which can be as high as 15%-20%. This could deter a lot of your prospects.
- Clickbank is not newbie friendly. If you are a new Clickbank affiliate, you will only get your first payment after 5 affiliate sales using 2 different payment methods. So if you manage to make 2 Partner upgrade commissions, and earn $200, you won’t get paid until you have 5 sales (hopefully your DFY list promoting other CB products will help) On top of that, if you’re not generating sales for 90 days, Clickbank will start deducting $1 per day from your balance, and its get worse the longer your account is dormant.
- As with most DFY systems, the list that you build will not be as effective as Chuck’s own efforts. He actually teaches on this under ‘becoming an authority’. You list don’t know who you are yet and don’t care until they trust you.
- There are no testimonials in the mastermind or inner circle FB group anyone produces sales results with Udimi or the even more costly Traffic For Me. The training on these paid methods is very basic and limited on how to log in and purchase traffic. These are high risk and yet there is no training available on how to measure success, what type of opt in you should aim for and how to determine your budget.
- There is some cross promotion, meaning that Chuck promotes others products to free and upgraded members. In once instance, he was promoting the same free training group that I was promoting to my list.
Financial Risk Exposure
Free Member: Low – the training is free, but some paid tools are recommended by the training
Partner: Medium to High – You might opt to invest in Clickmagic and Getresponse. You might try the paid advertising and get no sales. You might not get enough MOS affiliate sales to reach your 5 sale Clickbank initial threshold, and run the risk of losing your commissions.
Legendary Partner: High to Very High – $1,000 is steep price to pay without knowing what exactly the special training is. You are out-of-pocket up front and may not earn any commissions or fail to meet the Clickbank threshold.
Is this program ethical?
Well, that depends. Some aspects are, while others raise some questions.
For the free training part of most of it, I would say definitely yes. Especially compared to the low bar that is set by the rest of the industry. The training and insights Chuck provides clearly come from his own experience. The free training provided would probably be charged for by some other ‘guru’.
Now, where the water gets cloudy and what I find questionable, is the Legendary Partner and ‘pass up’ commissions. I’m not a fan of these at all. I question the idea that Honestly, I have pay ‘n high ticket price for inner circle training and the right earn higher commissions from your referrals and their referrals who aren’t upgraded.
Now, it might be that my opinion is biased because of my distaste for programs in the past like Inner Circle Riches and Empower Network.
In the Inner Circle FB group, Chuck teaches and encourages concepts like scarcity and FOMO (fear of missing out). Pass up commissions cleverly tap into FOMO.
Scarcity and FOMO by itself is not unethical. If a shop runs a temporary promotion on a blender you considered buying, or limits the number available on special, you might be motivated into buying. The difference is, the blender remains the same, with or without the promotion. And you the product is already selling at normal retail price.
FOMO in pass up commissions works the other way round. You pay a higher price with the promise of some additional high value training and the fear of missing out potential high value pass up commissions. You are not entirely sure what you are getting for your high value purchase and therefore can’t compare or benchmark it.
Pass Up example:
So Let’s break it down with an example.
- You decide to join and pay for the partner upgrade, so you become an affiliate and can promote the program to earn commissions and receive additional training. You choose not to upgrade to Legendary since you first want to check things out.
- You manage to refer a free member, that is from your own efforts, using your time and/or money.
- You follow up, offer support and coaching. The free member upgrades to partner. As a result, you earn $100 commissions.
- Next, that person whom you referred then decides to upgrade to Legendary Partner. Because you’re not Legendary, you pass up $500 commission to your sponsor, or whomever is the next level qualified upgraded Legendary Partner.
How would you feel about this: The person who receives the $500 pass up commission has not done any additional work to earn this, apart from paying for this ‘right’ to earn that pass up from your promotion efforts.
Therefore, in my view the incentive for the Legendary Partner upgrade is mostly financial, based on the fear of missing out potential pass up commissions. The Inner Circle training I saw during my launch free trial in the FB group is not something that I would pay $1,000 for. It was mostly prospecting and closing sales on FB. To be fair though, this was during launch and there may be some good training coming, or maybe there won’t. That is risk you take.
But wait, don’t other affiliate programs offer different commissions for free and upgraded affiliates?
Yes, but there is a big difference. Many affiliate programs offer 2 levels of commissions, for example 25% for free members and 50% for upgraded members. The difference is that all commissions will go to you, free or upgraded
Final Verdict – Would I recommend My Online Startup?
Free Member – For the free training alone, definitely. I enjoyed going through it and learned some new things. I still go back to some motivational sections when feel that I lack focus.
Partner Upgrade – If you are already confident in FB prospecting and closing sales, you could probably duplicate the results of the other successful MOS members in a matter of days. This is evident from the posts in the FB group and welcoming of actual new members.
The DFY list building option can also be useful if you really want to start building your own email list from scratch in a matter of days, and want don’t want to invest time in finding affiliate offers, building your own follow up emails and designing capture pages. Just remember that the real work is growing your list subscribers and that you won’t initially achieve the same results as seasoned marketers. If your main focusing is list building, I rather would recommend this free course.
Legendary Partner – If you are comfortable with the ethics of the pass up system and have the money to invest and take the risk, it may pay off. There are definitely some Legendary Partners making huge commissions and I would not deny that. You must remember though that each person is different and people who struggle are usually embarrassed to post about in FB groups, especially when there are so many posts about $100 paydays by the super affiliates.
So, how does this compare to my top recommendation, Wealthy Affiliate?
In free memberships, they are quite similar
- Free blog available
- Quality training available for free members
- However, WA free members can also take part in the affiliate program.
Now, in the upgraded memberships comparison is where WA really pulls ahead.
For less than the $1,200 (plus potential VAT/GST) cost of MOS Legendary upgrade, you can get 2 years annual Premium Membership at Wealthy Affiliate.
Comments, questions and thoughts
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