I’m sure you’re here because you want to know more about Aspire and Digital Altitude. You’re tempted to try the program but you want to find out more.
You’ve probably seen reviews promoting this program that make it sound very easy to earn money. I’m always very wary when something seems too good to be true!
I was referred to Aspire part of the Digital Altitude program when I was researching my Point and Click Profit review, so I thought I’d take a closer look.
I have seen many affiliates claiming to make good money with Digital Altitude but also seen quite a few negative reviews. So who to believe?
The only way to find out is to review the program myself, here we go!
Product: Aspire Digital Altitude
Overall Ranking: 10 out of 100 or 0.5/5 stars
Price: $1 for a 14-day trial, Aspire $36, $67 or $127 per month other levels start at $597 and go to $27997!
Owner: Michael Force
Website: http://www.digitalaltitude.co/products/aspire/
Update: February 8th, 2018 FTC Obtains Court Order Halting Business Coaching Scheme
At the FTC’s request, a federal court has temporarily halted the operations of Digital Altitude you can read the press release here.
Background
Digital Altitude (DA) has been online since 2015, the owner, Michael Force, has been around the internet marketing world for a while. Michael is an ex-marine who managed to build his first multi-million dollar business by the age of 27.
He was previously involved with various companies of dubious reputations Carbon Copy Pro or Pro U, Mobile Money Code, Empower Network and My Online Business Empire (MBOE).
Some of the training on DA is very similar to My Top Tier Business and MBOE. In fact, the programs are so similar MBOE are suing Digital Altitude for copyright infringements.
There are a couple of complaints about Michael Force on the RipoffReport although they are not related to Digital Altitude it does give you some background to the founder of this program.
Most of the programs Michael has been involved with are programs that I would call borderline scams. So can we have confidence in Digital Altitude?
What Is Aspire and Digital Altitude?
Aspire is essentially a training system to help you build an online business. Aspire is the lowest entry point of Digital Altitude. There are 5 other levels you can buy in Digital Altitude.
All levels have training packages to help you build your business and create leads. The training is made up of digital courses for the lower levels and 3 to 7-day seminars for the higher levels.
As you complete one level of training you are encouraged to upgrade to the next level. This might be a natural progression but as you progress it gets darned expensive.
Essentially you pay for a level of the training system with that training you will learn how to attract others into the system. You earn commissions when your referrals complete the sign-up process.
This program is all about signing up as many new recruits as you can and your referrals will have to continue the same way to make money.
I have seen some affiliates say that you don’t have to sign up new members. As it’s a training system you can follow the training and start any another online business.
For someone wanting to start their own online business, there are much better and above all much cheaper training platforms that I would choose long before Digital Altitude.
Therefore, if you join DA you do so with the intention of marketing these products to others!
Who Is This For?
It could be said this is for anyone who wants to earn some money online. But unfortunately, that’s not completely true. The different training levels are designed to help you build your business so the logic says to succeed you will need to invest in your training.
Nothing wrong with that, I think investing in training is a wise thing to do. In this case, after the first level of Aspire, the prices increase substantially, going all the way up to $27,997. There are intermediate prices, for example, $1997 or $9997.
This doesn’t mean the training is worth this much, no, this is just to create more revenue for the affiliates. Are you really be prepared to pay $28,000 for training or even worse if you buy the whole program it will cost a massive $58,000!
If you haven’t got this kind of money then this isn’t probably isn’t for you. It’s true, if you start at the lowest level it will “only” cost you $54 per month, to have a chance of earning. But you will have to invest more in the form of ads to get traffic to your offer.
Another thing to remember, it’s not as easy as some affiliates would have you believe. Many of the people you see making money with this program are experienced marketers, they may have a big email list to whom they promote Digital Altitude or a website already getting lots of traffic.
On the Digital Altitude about page, they say this:
Our program was not designed for business people. It was designed for moms, dads, high school graduates, waiters and waitresses, passionate creatives, college dropouts and anyone in between.
Most of the above group of people won’t be able to afford the cheapest monthly fee and certainly not the high ticket fees. In addition, they might be encouraged to get themselves into debt by the coaches.
There are other programs that teach you how to build an online business for considerably less. Read about the program I recommend here.
How It Works
You sign up and pay $1 for the 14-day trial but by doing this DA will collect your personal details including your credit card info. Then you are assigned to a coach.
The coach will go through the first steps with you and release further steps as you progress. You are drip fed the training, you can’t go at your own speed, which is something I don’t like. If you have any questions you can contact your coach by email or Skype.
Your coach can also close sales on your behalf but if he does you earn less commission.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Some training provided
- Help to close sales from your coach – useful if you have no experience
- 14-day trial for $1
Cons
- Products too expensive
- You have to pay to be an affiliate
- You have to buy a product to earn commission on that product
- Only 72 hours to obtain a refund for high-ticket products
- Income derived from signing up new members
- If your coach completes a sale you will lose 20% of your commission
Aspire Price and Compensation Plan
Aspire has 3 membership levels
- Aspire Walker, $37 per month
- Aspire Hiker, $67 per month
- Aspire Climber, $127 per month
The different levels have different compensation plans. Not surprisingly the more you spend the more you can earn.
- Walker 40% commission on 1 tier
- Hiker 50% commission on 2 tiers (40% on 1st tier, 10% 2nd tier)
- Climber 60% commission on 3 tiers (45% on 1st tier, 10% 2nd tier, 5% 3rd tier)
In the table above you can see the potential earnings from 500 leads.
- 5% or 25 people opt-in to Walker
- of that 25 new members 60% or 15 people upgrade to Hiker
- then 60% of the 15 Hiker members upgrade to Climber
Before you can start earning you also have to join their affiliate program $17 per month. This means the least you will pay is $54 per month. But ideally, you want to be at the Climber level which means you will have to fork out $144 per month just to see if this will work for you!
Once you are a paid up member of Aspire you can start promoting the system to others. However, if you are “lucky” enough to have someone sign up for one of the higher levels you will only receive the commission if you have purchased the level yourself. If not the commission will go to your referrer or the first qualified affiliate in their upline.
The Products
Digital Altitude is presented as a mountain and the higher you climb the more money you can make. To be able to “climb” you have to buy the successive levels and that becomes more and more expensive.
Digital Altitude has no real products for sale, you will be marketing membership for the different levels. Below are the different levels of training, aimed at helping you build your business with the price and some of the subjects covered.
- Aspire is the first level, the prices are mentioned above – steps to set up and promote your business
- Base $597 one time fee – preparing, launching, and growing your business
- Rise $1997 one time fee – having the right mindset, knowing your customer, sales writing
- Ascend $9997 one time fee – 3-day retreat* – find and scale traffic, create your own brand, increase conversions, outsourcing
- Peak $16997 one time fee – 5-day retreat* – scaling your business, accounting, motivating your team, growing sales, business efficiency, raise more capital, mistakes to avoid
- Apex $27997 one time fee – 7-day retreat* – how to become financially free, investing secrets, create long-term wealth, how to protect yourself from the predators, investing in property
*The retreats are all inclusive for 2 people.
If you need help with payments for the different levels they have payment plans and financing available.
Refund Policy
As these products are so expensive I thought I’d take a look to see what sort of refund policy they offer.
There is a strict 14-day refund policy on the Aspire products. For all the other products there is just a strict 72-hour return policy. I’m surprised the return policy is so short on these high-ticket packages. If Digital Altitude has confidence in the products why not give a longer refund period?
You can cancel your membership at anytime. To do so you will have to contact your coach who will ask you some questions about why you’re quitting and will, of course, try to convince you to continue.
Final Thoughts
In my opinion, Digital Altitude or Aspire is not a scam, as they do have a product, it’s the type of program I hate, for the following reasons.
- You have to pay to be an affiliate. With other legitimate affiliate programs, for example, Amazon or Clickbank you don’t need to pay.
- You do get some training which may be useful but it’s possible to obtain better training for much less. The prices you have to pay with DA are just crazy.
- With this scheme, your income potential is related to how much you spend. This should never be the case, your income should be related to the number products you sell.
- As this is really a recruitment scheme once the supply of new recruits dries up, the company will slowly collapse.
If you’re just starting in the online business world with very little money, the question I think you should ask is, will you be able to make money with this program?
Say you have the money for the first payment of $37 and then what? You will be encouraged to upgrade or to place ads and spend money you probably don’t have. When you reach that point, hopefully, you will get out and not put in more money.
New Aspire members will have seen the claims of other members who are making many $1000’s per month. The people making money will be experienced affiliate marketers, who market the program to their follows. These claims aren’t the typical results that you should expect.
Even if accomplished affiliate marketers can make money, how will you feel encouraging other people to join the program? Personally, I wouldn’t be happy getting others to join Digital Altitude unless I told them first that they might invest $1000’s without any return.
Verdict: Not Recommended
Setting Up An Online Business
One of the great advantages of setting up an online business is that it normally costs very little. Even with an excellent training program that includes all the tools you need, help and support it shouldn’t cost more than $50 per month.
If you put in the work and follow a training program you can make money. There is no time frame, no promises of a fortune, no secret ingredients just hard work, determination, and patience.
There is no magical formula to making money online don’t believe any program that tells you any different.
Read About The Program That Taught Me To Make Money Online
Thanks for reading, if you have any experience with Aspire and Digital Altitude I would love to hear from you.
