Trading System Subscriptions

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rjs1956

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This is a general opinion question. I am always wondering why gurus charge for "membership" in order to participate in their trading system. The nagging question for me always is - if the system were good the guru should be independently wealthy and therefore not need to charge for memberships. It is perplexing. I always want to ask them how well they are doing with their own strategy. And if they need the subscription money so much then perhaps their strategy is not as good as they say.

Anyone else have thoughts on this?
 
That's the key question.

Of course, the fact that they're selling a service instead of concentrating on trading doesn't mean they can't trade. At the very least it suggests they want an income stream that is either lower risk and/or they more consistent than trading. But these aren't very good reasons in my opinion.
 
tomorton said:
That's the key question.

Of course, the fact that they're selling a service instead of concentrating on trading doesn't mean they can't trade. At the very least it suggests they want an income stream that is either lower risk and/or they more consistent than trading. But these aren't very good reasons in my opinion.
Click to expand...

I agree 100%. The phrase "Doctor heal thyself" comes to mind. Maybe someday someone will offer a free educational service based on their successful strategy that left them so wealthy they don't need subscription fees.
 
Well there's lots of free stuff on this site, and there's an on-going support in the event of specific queries - all free.
 
Understanding principle of "Fair Exchange of Value"

rjs1956,

Good question. And tomorton posts have good answers.

I'd like to add (& possibly introduce to newbies) that there is a very important principle of Wealth Building - it is the principle of "Fair Exchange of Value" (FEV).

A good Servant is worth his hire. So the saying goes...

From the perspective of gurus, signal providers, etc - there may be ongoing operational Costs. For example:

Time: for communicating and providing excellent service and Value for Clients; Time required for training Clients and even Operational staff; Time required for ongoing management of services, personnel, compliance, etc.

Monetary Costs: Staff personnel to provide Valuable service; maintain technologies and redundant capabilities; compliance & regulatory operational Expenses; marketing & Client acquisition Costs; and many more.

These may require Subscription Fees and more.

But, even more important - from the Client perspective, a big IF here - IF the Client is receiving High Value service (eg profitable signal alerts), AND the Client doesn't UNDERSTAND the FEV principle above...

then the Client will ALWAYS believe and FEEL that such services should be FREE and complimentary. In the business world, that the service should be "comped" forever.

In such a Client perspective and Belief model, it means that the Client has no UNDERSTANDING of Fair Exchange of Value.

FEV is an important Belief for successful Wealth Building! It is beyond the scope if this post to teach and apply FEV here.

Please research the following resources (invaluable for all Traders and investors) including books, PDFs, and many available YouTube videos:

A. Millionaire Mindset (T Harv Eker)
B. Think & Grow Rich (Napoleon Hill)
C. You Were Born Rich (Bob Proctor)

Traders and Investors who don't UNDERSTAND and cannot apply FEV correctly - will be very UNLIKELY to achieve consistent Trading and Investing profit-ABILITY.

This is b/c Wealth Building requires the Wealth Builder to process and reciprocate FEV properly!

So while receiving free guru Trainings, free signal alerts service, may MAKE some $$$ - however the LACK of FEV Belief and UNDERSTANDING will make KEEPING the $$$ an unlikely final Result.

Good topic to really Learn and develop deep Understanding! About < 5% general public know, understand FEV and how to make $$$. And this is why the top 5% makes and KEEPS 99% of all income!

Hope this helps some - and stimulate T2W Members to do greater study/research into FEVs to build income streams and Wealth Building.

Good Trading to all.

WklyOptions
 
Well that's fair enough I think.

If as a newbie I could teach myself how to fish I wouldn't need to work to get money to buy fish from someone else and need never go hungry.

So it might be worth paying someone to teach me to fish - then I could start catching fish sooner. And maybe catch more of them. Maybe catch bigger fish.

Then of course I could teach other people how to fish.

Though personally I'd rather be out fishing.
 
WklyOptions said:
rjs1956,

Good question. And tomorton posts have good answers.

I'd like to add (& possibly introduce to newbies) that there is a very important principle of Wealth Building - it is the principle of "Fair Exchange of Value" (FEV).

A good Servant is worth his hire. So the saying goes...

From the perspective of gurus, signal providers, etc - there may be ongoing operational Costs. For example:

Time: for communicating and providing excellent service and Value for Clients; Time required for training Clients and even Operational staff; Time required for ongoing management of services, personnel, compliance, etc.

Monetary Costs: Staff personnel to provide Valuable service; maintain technologies and redundant capabilities; compliance & regulatory operational Expenses; marketing & Client acquisition Costs; and many more.

These may require Subscription Fees and more.

But, even more important - from the Client perspective, a big IF here - IF the Client is receiving High Value service (eg profitable signal alerts), AND the Client doesn't UNDERSTAND the FEV principle above...

then the Client will ALWAYS believe and FEEL that such services should be FREE and complimentary. In the business world, that the service should be "comped" forever.

In such a Client perspective and Belief model, it means that the Client has no UNDERSTANDING of Fair Exchange of Value.

FEV is an important Belief for successful Wealth Building! It is beyond the scope if this post to teach and apply FEV here.

Please research the following resources (invaluable for all Traders and investors) including books, PDFs, and many available YouTube videos:

A. Millionaire Mindset (T Harv Eker)
B. Think & Grow Rich (Napoleon Hill)
C. You Were Born Rich (Bob Proctor)

Traders and Investors who don't UNDERSTAND and cannot apply FEV correctly - will be very UNLIKELY to achieve consistent Trading and Investing profit-ABILITY.

This is b/c Wealth Building requires the Wealth Builder to process and reciprocate FEV properly!

So while receiving free guru Trainings, free signal alerts service, may MAKE some $$$ - however the LACK of FEV Belief and UNDERSTANDING will make KEEPING the $$$ an unlikely final Result.

Good topic to really Learn and develop deep Understanding! About < 5% general public know, understand FEV and how to make $$$. And this is why the top 5% makes and KEEPS 99% of all income!

Hope this helps some - and stimulate T2W Members to do greater study/research into FEVs to build income streams and Wealth Building.

Good Trading to all.

WklyOptions
Click to expand...


Just in the middle of re-reading Think & Grow Rich. While it does have its critics, I believe there are plenty of life lessons in it, such as, 'There are no shortcuts!'

Its key suggestions being, that to be successful, one has to have:
1. Desire
2. Faith
3. Planning
4. Persistence

IMO to be a successful trader, one has to treat it like they are setting up and running a business. If I do decide to open my own thread over on Trader's Journal, I will probably touch on this in more detail.
 
Dear rjs1956.
it seems you have already received a lot of good responses here.

I will just add my 2p:
I think your initial question is a very good one - why would they bother to sell their signals rather than trading it themselves?

There are quite some benefits to traders running live trading rooms, in that it creates more structure and discipline for them, and often 'forces' them to be better traders - though this can often be balanced out by the 'need to trade' and 'need to perform' - trading is hard enough as it is - why then place more pressure on yourself during the trading day! All that reasoning, however, is less applicable to non-real-time signal services.

One good question to ask yourself, when considering live trading rooms or signal services, is whether, aside from potentially having profitable trades - what learning will you receive from the signal provider - depending on the provider, they may provide a lot of analysis and explanation for their trades - meaning you can learn a lot from their experience - and this approach is generally far cheaper than if you were to hire them as a coach. I learned a great deal from participating in different rooms - the learning was a bigger benefit then the actual trades that came out of the room - but this depends a lot on how well the trader explains his/her trades - often trial periods are sufficient for establishing this and/or just signing up for 1 month.

Hope that helps.
 
"The nagging question for me always is - if the system were good the guru should be independently wealthy and therefore not need to charge for memberships."
Click to expand...

Not necessarily.

In my opinion, by far the most difficult part of trading is developing a profitable strategy. Hard, frustrating work that takes a long time, but is ultimately rewarding.

Once you have a profitable strategy, you might think that's it, your rich. All you have to do is trade that strategy and you're home and dry, right? Wrong.

Monetising a successful strategy is far from easy. For a start, you need a capital to trade with. Sensible money-management rules dictate you not risk more than, say, 2% of your capital at any time, and this fact alone places a cap on the amount of profit you can make in a given timescale.

So even if you have $10,000 of capital, and your strategy gains 10% per month (which would be an excellent strategy) that's still only $1,000. You can't live off that, and it's probably better to re-invest it anyway.

So it's no surprise that there's plenty of traders out there with profitable strategies who look to make an income from it by selling subscriptions or signals.

The fact that a trader does that does not mean their strategy is not a good one.
 
rjs1956 said:
This is a general opinion question. I am always wondering why gurus charge for "membership" in order to participate in their trading system. The nagging question for me always is - if the system were good the guru should be independently wealthy and therefore not need to charge for memberships. It is perplexing. I always want to ask them how well they are doing with their own strategy. And if they need the subscription money so much then perhaps their strategy is not as good as they say.

Anyone else have thoughts on this?
Click to expand...

for centuries the wealthy have always paid for professional advice and money management ........they outsource this specialisation whilst they conentrate their personal efforts on other things ......

as long as that service can deliver the goods then everyone wins

regarding your question .......if we set aside the high % of vendors that cant trade for toffee and are trying to make a few bucks conning traders with courses and systems ......

lets focus on the few that actually can make money but also choose to sell their training and services (as in my example above)

why ?

well it is regular income stream that they can use to leverage other activities .......just because you are good at trading doesnt mean you already have infinite capital available to leverage your trading ........so use other peoples money like all smart business people do .........

sure theres other possible reasons .......some traders like to train and it adds more dimension to the boredom of trading .......who knows ?....giving something back ? .........whatever

if you ever have trained or mentored a lot of people you would realise how much a responsibility it is and how draining it can be if you are doing it properly .so there fore like any training business it demands a decent return .....

again my caveat here is the few trainers and courses that genuinely help and work ..........the others are just mugging traders off for quick money

N
 
rjs1956 said:
This is a general opinion question. I am always wondering why gurus charge for "membership" in order to participate in their trading system. The nagging question for me always is - if the system were good the guru should be independently wealthy and therefore not need to charge for memberships. It is perplexing. I always want to ask them how well they are doing with their own strategy. And if they need the subscription money so much then perhaps their strategy is not as good as they say.

Anyone else have thoughts on this?
Click to expand...

Fishing and Doctors are not good examples, because in the market not only you might not catch fish, but you will loose all your fishing equipment, similar with the doctor's example...

Wealthy people can hire professionals to manage their money, but yet to see a hedge fund manager gives his trading strategy to his clients...

For so many years watching the markets, I am yet to see a "trading guru mentor" to sell a successful trading strategy that can be verified by a 3rd party auditors...

All of them are charlatans scamming the new traders and no wonder 95% of the traders fail...

Just check this website and read trough the heart breaking stories of people trusting and losing the dream of freedom and financial Independence...

https://www.tradingschools.org/
 
IceMan said:
IMO to be a successful trader, one has to treat it like they are setting up and running a business.
Click to expand...

That seems to imply if someone wants to be a successful roulette player, all they have to do is set up a roulette playing business, then their mathematical odds in roulette will increase ?

In fact the best way to be a successful roulette player is not set up a business but to study the practices of the casino and see if there are any weaknesses in what they do and then take advantage of the weakness. Same applies in trading.

For instance, in trading, the weakness of the merchants who operate markets is that they depend very heavily on misinformation to hoodwink their customers. So, if you ignore their misinformation such as setting up businesses and other seemingly clever ideas, you would have gained an advantage on them.
 
IceMan said:
IMO to be a successful trader, one has to treat it like they are setting up and running a business. If I do decide to open my own thread over on Trader's Journal, I will probably touch on this in more detail.
Click to expand...


This is a key principle, and one that people who run actual businesses sometimes seem to lose sight of. The point, and the only point, of a business is to make money.

Trading especially but not uniquely seems to attract people who have other objectives layered over making money, and these only complicate their business decisions.

Its amazing that periodically we see threads on various forums asking "What are your reasons for trading?". This should be the most redundant question ever. The answer is to make money. Nothing else is relevant to trading.
 
tomorton said:
This is a key principle, and one that people who run actual businesses sometimes seem to lose sight of. The point, and the only point, of a business is to make money.

Trading especially but not uniquely seems to attract people who have other objectives layered over making money, and these only complicate their business decisions.

Its amazing that periodically we see threads on various forums asking "What are your reasons for trading?". This should be the most redundant question ever. The answer is to make money. Nothing else is relevant to trading.
Click to expand...

Isn't that one of the (to me anyway) strange things that trading psychologists reveal about people – that they have other, subconscious reasons for trading i.e. they get out of the market whatever it is they want. So presumably 80% of traders want to lose money? Or maybe they just like the pain/excitement/disappointment of making failed trades?

I've only ever wanted to make money out of the market and can't really see any other logical reason for a continued participation if it ends up being a drain on hard earned resources. Sure, it's great fun, it's nice to see a trade "come together" blah blah and all the rest of it – but if there is no financial reward at the end of it then it's time to move on to something else.

The only conscience-pricking thing I sometimes have at the back of my mind is that my success depends on the 80% losers – hard cheddar for them but then, life's a bitch isn't it?
 
EnlightenedJoe said:
That seems to imply if someone wants to be a successful roulette player, all they have to do is set up a roulette playing business, then their mathematical odds in roulette will increase ?

The point I was wanting to make was about having a business mindset rather than actuall setting up a business. As you have pointed out, the two scenarios are different.

In fact the best way to be a successful roulette player is not set up a business but to study the practices of the casino and see if there are any weaknesses in what they do and then take advantage of the weakness. Same applies in trading.

This I would liken to carrying out market research, finding an advantage over your competitors and identifying and edge or U.P.S.

For instance, in trading, the weakness of the merchants who operate markets is that they depend very heavily on misinformation to hoodwink their customers. So, if you ignore their misinformation such as setting up businesses and other seemingly clever ideas, you would have gained an advantage on them.

I guess I would liken these merchants to a business's competitors. And as you have quite rightly implied. they should generally be ignored, focus on what is within your control, rather than what everyone else is doing
Click to expand...

I hope this provides some clarity with regards to the intention of my analogy in my previous post.
 
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