Hey,
Bring the Fresh insider investigation of SEO guru and software designer Brad Callen.
Brad Callen is an online marketer specializing in Search Engine Optimization (or SEO) and SEO tools like Keyword Elite, SEO Elite, Keyword Metro, PPC Web Spy and Niche Revolution.
We’ve gotten loads of questions about SEO and the tools, strategies and gurus involved…
…So Bring the Fresh decided to launch an insider investigation into Brad Callon and the software that he’s offering because he’s been one of the highest profile names in SEO and SEO tools for years, and because many guru affiliates tout his software.
Here’s the scoop:
I met Brad in the summer of 2006 while I was working on what turned out to become the October StomperNet 14 million dollar day.
What a lot of folks don’t know is that Brad Callen was one of the top three affiliates in that launch along side my Bring the Fresh partner Kelly Felix, founder of the Rich Jerk, and John Reese, from the Traffic Secrets million dollar day.
It turns out that Brad was able to parlay a small but growing list of prospects and the lure of a free copy of Keyword Elite and SEO Elite to so many of his customers that, along with Kelly and John Reese, Brad was able to do more than a million dollars in affiliate sales for StomperNet!
Why was Callen’s promotion so effective? And what was the value of Keyword Elite and SEO Elite both then and now?
And what about now, three and a half years later?
While so far Brad Callen has thus far avoided feature on some of the more prominent controversy based sites that review online marketing ideas, strategies and gurus, a basic search of BlackHatForum.com reveals that Callen’s name infests the forum for sneaky, clandestine, underground and sometimes shady ways for getting web traffic to your site using SEO (and other interesting and things done online.)
Taking a step back and getting even more basic, if you type Brad Callen scam into Google, a number of angry and frustrated posts appear.
Some seem a little silly, like a fellow doing a 180 on Callen, and going from a big supporter to a major hater because of the new pricing for SEO Elite, which went from a one time cost of $167 to a monthly cost of $47…certainly a steep increase for folks who keep the software a while, but by no means a “scam.”
But other unanswered questions are more ominous. Listen, it’s almost impossible to keep a clean slate in the online marketing space where it’s so easy for an enemy to attack your name (and maybe Callen is ironically getting an SEO attack from his jealous competition!)
So Bring the Fresh is keeping a very open mind in this investigation and we’ll tell you more soon.
It’s all happening,
Mike Long
P.S. Bring the Fresh is a site founded by Kelly Felix and I, where we let our students look over our shoulders to see exactly how we’ve helped build over 30 million dollars worth of businesses online.