EO Ottawa member David Ryan wanted to be cautious about his plans. While anxious to get his new company, Electronic Time Capsule, off the ground, he needed to ensure he husbanded his resources.
"I sold my other business to fund this one," he said. "I'm thirty-one and the father of two— I can't afford to throw US$85,000 down the well."
It just so happens US$85,000 was the amount an infomercial company wanted in exchange for marketing his product. "They said their researchers had found me," he said of the unexpected call he received. "They sold me on their business, and they did a good job. They sold it well."
So well, in fact, that Ryan was very close to using them. But just to be sure, he put in a request to Member Exchange (M2Mx), one of EO’s most popular member benefits. He asked if anyone had heard of this company and if they knew whether or not it was legitimate.
"Later I got a call, not from a YPOer, but from a friend of a YPOer who had gotten my request," he said. The caller told him that the infomercial company was a con. "He said, 'You give this company so much as one dollar, and you'll never see it again.' I got three calls like that!"
So, with a certain sense of relief, Ryan dropped the idea. "I'm still not 100 percent sure that [the infomercial company] wasn't legitimate," he said. "But I can't afford to take chances like that."
Ryan is grateful that he was warned off the infomercial by other members through M2Mx. "I've used M2Mx five or six times," he said. "Sometimes I get no responses, other times it has helped a lot. I don't understand anyone who just uses it once, gets nothing and says, 'Oh, it never works for me.' You have to keep trying it out. It's a tool, a useful tool; one of many that I have access to, and in this case, it certainly came through for me— it saved me eighty-five grand!"