Are you considering James Hopkins Coaching but not sure what exactly is really is? Yeah I was confused too when I saw his ads plastered over my Youtube video.
He talks about this broke expat vs wealthy expat lifestyle and runs ads to countries such as Thailand where many of these poor expats are teaching English and burning their cash.
So what exactly is James Hopkins pitching and ultimately is it worth the money?
Who is James Hopkins?
From the start you hear all about how he went from a broke call centre guy in Chiang Mai to earning $20,000 per month online. It's a typical story, then comes the success stories and the countless students who are now making money living a life of freedom. Then he decided to help others do the same.
But what exactly are you buying here? Well it's called James Hopkins coaching, and he basically offers a twice weekly live Q+A coaching call, access to his training course and a Facebook community.
He makes it pretty cryptic but basically you need to start offering a high value skill that others can't offer. That skill is social media marketing, more commonly referred to as social media marketing agencies (SMMA)
Ultimately that's what you'll be doing, taking a brick and mortar business by the hand and getting them more leads and sales with digital ads. In return you'll get a monthly retainer and they pay for the ad spend.
You can easily make up to $5000 per month James claims and to be fair, you definitely can.
It's simple, run an ad on Facebook for a local business, give something away and the leads will come.
His sales pitch is very similar to Dan Lok, you know the asian guy who sits in the Bentley.. Yeah him. He made millions telling people how to get a high quality skill few people have, it looks like James Hopkins is doing the same, minus the Bentley.
But do you really need coaching for this type of business model?
And how do you know if it's the right business model for you? It sounds great, living a life of luxury, lieing on a beach, only needing WiFi.
But the biggest point that no one ever mentions is this...
How do you actually get your OWN clients?
James didn't cover this at all in his webinar, in fact he invites you to take a free coaching call with one of his team. That's right, he doesn't even speak to you until you signup for his coaching service.
But really, how do you get clients?
According to one of his students whom spoke and showed their account with imrhys.com you get access to the 2 weekly Q+A coaching as we've established but additionally to this you get access to a 7 week training program which provides guidance and helps you learn the basics of social media marketing.
This course is actually the James Hopkins Lifestyle Marketeer program which you may see referenced in other parts of his ad copy and webinars. This also includes downloadable action steps you must complete.
There are coaches that are part of James' team and while James is present, some of the Q+A calls are with randoms such as Glen.
You get access to real done for you cold email scripts that you can email clients, you also get cold calling scripts that you can rattle off when calling clients. You could also run your own ads.
James shows you how to setup your entire business from scratch. From forming your business to creating ads for clients to outsourcing and managing your own team.
From what we can see it's definitely a good course, lots of content but the real value you're buying is the coaching Q+A calls.
Trustpilot Reviews
James has a lot of positive reviews on Trustpilot which is surprising and raises a few eye brows.
It's rare for a company to have so many positive feedbacks and if you know how this platform works, if you pay Trustpilot for a premium account you can ask them to remove any 'fake' reviews. But most people use this to their advantage by claiming any negative review is fake.
It goes like this,
Oh we couldn't find this customer in our database so they must be fake unless the reviewer provides proof. Of course the reviewer may not want to reveal their identity or doesn't reply. So negative reviews are removed.
In terms of James' coaching nearly every review left is 5 stars and was created by a user with 1 review. The ones that stand out are those that actually took the time to upload a photo to their profile, left the review and never came back.
On some days multiple reviews are left, is that likely? Take 27th September 2019, there's dozens of reviews left.
It's up to you what you make of this but I wouldn't trust anything you read on Trustpilot.
Verdict
You need to look through the sales pitch here, you're buying a social media marketing agency course and there's literally dozens of them out there already, all offering the same thing at various prices. James Hopkins has a ton of positive reviews on a platform that can be questionable and everyone in the industry knows that. Regardless he offers a well rounded package in the form of a training course and weekly coaching calls.
You definitely can do no wrong in signing up for his coaching service.
My #1 SMMA Recommendation
Voted as the #1 course on imrhys.com for the last year, the smma blueprint is one of the most powerful social media marketing courses for starting your own agency from anywhere in the world.
At a fraction of the price, they offer 75+ video lessons across a wide range of modules so you can start your own agency in days. You also get access to a community as well as on going coaching calls.
The course is offered by two real agency owners who have proven experience in this business.
Last Updated on November 23, 2019 by Rhys Dale
Rhys is the owner and chief editor at Im Rhys and is living in Chisinau, Moldova. With over 15 years experience in eCommerce and Affiliate Marketing he has started many successful 6 and 7 figure businesses. After successes with USA and China dropshipping, he expanded into building 70+ micro affiliate websites in 30 different niches that generate money on autopilot. He now helps his wife to run her social media agency as well as travelling the world at every opportunity.
Thank you! I already thought, something is not not kosher with the 5stars reviews for James Hopkins.
Seriously… the reviews are fake.
Please please do your research before you pay hundreds to thousands of dollars you don’t have for something that isn’t even guaranteed to work. He was also really quite unprofessional in response when I asked what happens if it doesn’t work for me and I had no money (ie. guaranteed results or refund). He became quite hostile and accusatory about it being dependent on my skill and if I’m a bad worker then of course it wouldn’t work. He then said he didn’t want to work with me anyway. I would be extremely wary of someone who gets this touchy about a few skeptical questions.
(continued) I even told him I wasn’t trying to be offensive… but that I am broke and really need to be sure it will work before I spend all I have. It was a perfectly reasonable question to ask, I feel… but his answer was cold and rude and he even told me to just go back to my regular stable job. ouch. Save yourselves, guys… he may have a few valuable tips but there’s no guarantee that they’ll pay off what you paid him.
I agree with you! I was told after a lengthy interview that I had been accepted as a new marketeer. Only then was I told that it would cost me £3,800!! But if I paid then they would give me a £1,000 discount. I said that I needed to discuss it with my partner first at which point I was bombarded with rebuttals about how this was a small percentage of what I could earn! Lots of pressure to make me part with my money. Needless to say I decided to stear clear of this one!!
Thank you for this review. Reflects my thoughts exactly. Although I must admit, James seems like a nice honest straightfoward guy. But the review thing does ring alarm bells.
He seriously isn’t… Try asking him a few skeptical questions and the mask comes down and he is rude and unprofessional and tells you you’d never succeed with your mindset anyway… So just by being skeptical = you’re not a good fit for us :-/
Exactly what came up to my mind looking for an honest review, impossible for a well-stablished brand to not have any negative reviews which are actually essential for the growth of a company.
(continued) I even told him I wasn’t trying to be offensive… but that I am broke and really need to be sure it will work before I spend all I have. It was a perfectly reasonable question to ask, I feel… but his answer was cold and rude and he even told me to just go back to my regular stable job. ouch. Save yourselves, guys… he may have a few valuable tips but there’s no guarantee that they’ll pay off what you paid him.
Does anyone know how much the course costs?
GBP 3,800. (British Pounds)
OH my word…listened to an hour and 20 minutes of long-winded repetitive video to find out that “the struggling expat” ( he markets to) has to pay to do his courses AFTER i asked straight out about costs involved. James sent me some vague response on facebook messenger and then when I further queried (please tell me about costs) my appointment was promptly cancelled!! Load of crap. Why not just upfront list the cost. Simple. Nothing new or revolutionary. He may know his stuff, fair enough. But I wouldn’t pay a cent, even if i had it, based on our “conversation”.
Why does this v mixed opinioned article end with: “You definitely can do no wrong in signing up for his coaching service”…?
It’s quite clear that it is possible to do wrong signing up for his service judging by the article itself, not to mention the comments
Thank you. I totally agree
A lot of these blog-style pages are so light-on that they don’t actually go anywhere in terms of a conclusion; they’re evidently just an ad hoc collection of neutral factoids and other low-hanging fruit, etc. It turns out that most of the critical content is created by us in the comments. 😆
Yeah this guy is a total fraud and a con artist.
Just like all the other fake gurus out there. For him to pray on people that are financially damaged due to the recent pandemic and have no problem scamming others when they are running on their last few dollars is absolutely disgusting.
These con artists and thieves need to be put in jail.
I am an experienced marketer and I can guarantee you that you will get more value off of watching videos on youtube or doing a Google search for free.
Shame on you James, you are a parasite and you prey on people who are desperate.
There is a special place for sociopaths like you.
Totally. As part of their sales pitch that invite you to join their private facebook group. You are banned from asking any questions seeking verification of the course – This is literally in the application form to join the group. And because those who sign up can get large referrals for signing up others, no one who has actually paid wants to rock the boat, risk getting kicked out of this inner circle and risk not being able to make their money back.
Also, a check on Companies House for James Hopkins Coaching Limited, shows last set of accounts, the company has less than 50k – hardly impressive considering the claims he makes.
Sure, there are bound to be some that are able to find some success with it, but I guarantee most won’t. It is almost like a cult. It is about time there were laws passed about these Dream Selling Marketing ‘Gurus’