I've been in digital marketing for over 25 years. I've worked with Fortune 10 companies. I've built an agency that made the Inc. 500/5000 list four times. And I'm going to tell you something that the guy in the rented Lamborghini on your Instagram feed won't: most of these training "gurus" are completely full of it.

The coaching and training industry is now worth over $6 billion globally, with more than 145,000 active coaches worldwide. That number has doubled since 2019. Let that sink in. The number of people calling themselves experts has doubled in five years.

Now, are some of those people legitimate? Absolutely. But the barrier to entry is zero. You don't need a license. You don't need credentials. You don't need a single day of real-world experience. You just need a ring light, a rented office, and the audacity to claim you made $100K last month.

The FTC has been busy. They returned over $28.9 million to victims of just one business coaching scam operation. Another scheme called MOBE bilked consumers so badly that the FTC sent $23 million back to more than 37,000 people who got conned. In 2024 alone, Americans reported losing $12.5 billion to fraud, a 25% jump from the year before. And those are just the people who reported it. The real number is significantly higher because most people are too embarrassed to admit they got taken.

Here's what I see over and over again. Some person pops up on social media claiming they cracked the code. They'll show you screenshots of revenue dashboards (easily faked), testimonials from "students" (often paid actors or fabricated entirely), and income claims that would make a Fortune 500 CEO raise an eyebrow.

"I made $50K in my first month using this one simple system!"

No. You didn't.

And even when someone did generate that kind of revenue, they conveniently leave out the $48K they spent on ads to get there. Revenue is not profit. Top-line numbers without context are meaningless. But they sound incredible on a TikTok, and that's all that matters to these people.

The FTC has been clear on this: legitimate businesses and coaches do not guarantee specific income levels. If someone is promising you six or seven figures in 90 days, that is almost certainly a scam. Their words, not mine. Although I happen to agree completely.

Because I've done this for 25+ years. I know what realistic results look like. I know how long it takes to build organic traffic. I know what a reasonable return on ad spend looks like. I know what it costs to acquire a customer in virtually every industry I've worked in.

When someone tells you they took a brand-new website from zero to 100,000 monthly visitors in 60 days with "just SEO," they're lying. When someone says they 10x'd a client's revenue in 30 days with a few Facebook ads, they're either lying or leaving out critical context that would make the claim meaningless.

I've seen what works and what doesn't work across hundreds of client engagements, Fortune 10 accounts, small businesses, startups, and everything in between. The stuff that works? It's not sexy. It takes time. It requires real strategy, consistent execution, and honest measurement.

That's not a great pitch for a $2,997 course, which is exactly why they don't sell it that way.

I don't lie about my results. I don't inflate numbers. I don't show you a revenue screenshot and pretend the margin was 90%. When I tell you something works, it's because I've personally seen it work across real campaigns for real clients over real timeframes.

I don't lie about who I am. I'm a guy from Texas who has been doing digital marketing since before Google was the dominant search engine. I built WrightIMC from nothing in 2007 and grew it into a recognized agency. I've worked with American Airlines, Disney, Coca-Cola, Microsoft. I'm not telling you that to impress you. I'm telling you that so you understand: when I share what I know, it comes from actually doing the work. Not from reading someone else's blog post and repackaging it as a $5,000 mastermind.

I tell you things straight. If something isn't going to work for your business, I'll tell you. If you're wasting money on the wrong channel, I'll tell you. If your expectations are unrealistic, I'll tell you that too. I'm not here to take your money and make you feel good. I'm here to help you get actual results.

If you're evaluating any trainer, coach, or marketing "expert," here's what should make you run the other direction:

Income claims with no context. Revenue means nothing without expenses, timeframes, and specifics. If they won't break it down, they're hiding something.

Pressure tactics. "This price goes away at midnight!" Legitimate expertise doesn't expire at midnight. If someone is good at what they do, they'll be good at it tomorrow too.

No verifiable track record. Can you find their actual work? Can you talk to real clients? Can you verify any of their claims independently? If the answer is no, that tells you everything.

They sell the dream, not the process. The good stuff is in the process. The ugly, boring, day-after-day execution that actually moves the needle. If all they talk about is the destination and never the road, they've probably never driven it.

Their only real business is selling courses about making money. Think about that for a second. Their expertise is selling you on the idea that they have expertise. That's a pyramid, not a business model.

The training and coaching space is flooded with people who are better at marketing themselves than they are at delivering results. The FTC is actively prosecuting these operations and has returned tens of millions of dollars to victims. The industry is essentially unregulated, which means you have to do your own due diligence.

I've spent 25+ years in the trenches. I've seen what works. I've seen what doesn't. And I'm not going to pretend that my way is the only way or that I have all the answers. But I will tell you the truth. Every single time.

That should be the bare minimum from anyone asking for your money and your trust. Unfortunately, for a lot of these gurus, it's more than they're willing to offer.

Tony Wright is the founder of WrightIMC , a digital marketing agency recognized four times on the Inc. 500/5000 list, and TexasCMO , providing fractional CMO services to growing businesses. He has 25+ years of digital marketing experience working with brands including American Airlines, Disney, Coca-Cola, and Microsoft.