How To Avoid Questionable Online Business Mentors

Online business mentors can be a great for your business. However, they can also be bad and throw you into financial ruin.

While most online business mentors do what they can to teach and council their mentees down the road of success, some are committed to making sure you fail. These scam artists are using this field for their own personal and financial gain.

Doing your research is the most common tip. Check out the business and find out what people are saying about it, but even after doing this you can still end up being scammed by so called online business mentors.

The reason being, this isn't the type of business where you are buying a product and then judging if it works or not. Obviously, if it was a simple product you would know immediately. But mentoring is an ongoing service where your success cannot be measured right away. And this is what scam artists tap into.

They know you have to give it sometime before you can say this isn't working. However, it's this same knowledge that can help you combat against online business mentors and their scam systems.

Even if you have never used online business mentors before, you know that the person is supposed to be providing you with the right information to build your online business. If at the end of the day your business doesn't seem to be making progress you are most likely being scammed.

Here are some tips to help you prevent being scammed.

1. Online businesses mentors are teachers. Just like with any course you would take, you expect your teacher to be knowledgeable in their subject matter.

The same applies to mentors. If your mentor cannot give you sound straightforward answers to your online business questions, it's a sign that you won't be getting the help you need.

2. Do they push products? You want to step back if your mentor insists on you purchasing more items in order to be successful.

In most cases the mentor has an affiliation with these products and simply wants to make the sale regardless of whether or not they will benefit your business. This isn't to say that your mentor will never recommend a product that can be beneficial, but if every lesson turns into a selling game beware. Chances are you'll be throwing a lot of money their way for products you don't need.

3. Specialization is very common with mentoring. Most online business mentors have a field within e-business that they excel in. It may be marketing, blogging, web design ect. This is why many mentoring programs offer team support where each member can provide support for that specific task.

A mentor who claims to be a master in virtually everything is not being entirely honest. In the sense that they can help you without previous extensive experience mentors are not coaches; they need to have an adequate amount of skill, knowledge and even talent to effectively help you.

Therefore, a legitimate mentor will almost always post where their areas of specialization is and in which industries. If their website/profile doesn't state exactly what areas they can help you in move on; you may be walking into a trap.

4. Follow your gut. Often we fail to simply listen to ourselves. It probably isn't right if it doesn't feel right. Mentoring is a relationship and like any relationship all parties need to feel comfortable.

If you and your mentor clash, if they don't devote enough attention to your goals, or if you can't learn with their teaching style you need to seek help elsewhere. It's not a matter of you being scammed, but that you won't get the most out of the experience to help your business.

Not all online business mentors are out for your money. Many of them operate real businesses that help their clients grow themselves and their own business. Consider the above tips to help make sure you work with someone who is committed to your success.