AWOL Academy – 8 UGLY Scam Signs You Should Know!

So you're looking for a legit opportunity to make money online and you came across AWOL Academy but you're wondering if it's a scam or not?

This company is making a buzz online as everyone is talking about it.

This AWOL Academy review is going to answer all the questions you might have about this program.

By reading this review you can save time and lots of money!

Summary: My final opinion is AWOL Academy is a good training for newbies & experienced people, however, I have NEVER seen a program this expensive.

You can make money without spending a capital. You need to be rich to get rich with AWOL Academy.

In this review, I'll give you 8 ugly red flags & sign signs about this training platform.

Rating: 3/5

Recommended? If you can afford it yes it's good training.

AWOL Academy is an online business training platform which claims to teach people how to create online businesses and how to achieve financial freedom.

If you're wondering what does the word "AWOL" means

It means Another Way of Life 😀

AWOL Academy has headquarters in Las Vegas, it was called Project AWOL when it was owned by another popular MLM company called Empower Network

AWOL Academy is a high ticket business opportunity which means you're going to learn how to promote VERY expensive products.

The good thing about promoting high ticket items is the fact that you're going to enjoy some REALLY good commissions.

Let's say you manage to sell a $10,000 product to someone, in this case, you're looking at at least $1000 in commissions depending on the percentage of the sale.

That's why you see a lot of people promoting AWOL it's mainly because of the commissions it offers to the affiliate, not because of their training.

The training is good no doubt but there are many BAD THINGS about AWOL Academy which I am going to share with you as we go further with this review.

Before I jump over to the next section here are some quick facts about AWOL Academy.

• AWOL Academy, Elite Push (artician.net now)& Global Affiliate Zone share the same founder.
• AWOL Academy used to be called "Project AWOL" when it was owned by Empower Network back in 2013. But now they are separated.
• Keala Kane has been featured on Forbes

AWOL Academy was created by Keala Kanae and his friend Kameron George in 2015. 

Keala Kanae is an entrepreneur who has made a huge success online.

Keala and his close friend Kameron George started working on a project with comes with a slogan Another Way of Life.

they wanted to create an online business platform where they make the average people live the " another way of life".

Keala is the one who you will see very often in the AWOL Academy training he does appear in the webinars, sales pages and the video tutorials inside the platform so he is basically the main spokesperson of the company.

AWOL Academy and Keala have also been featured on Forbes

Kameron Goerge, on the other hand, he does advertising and the filming of the AWOL TV promotional videos.

He also has a cool Youtube channel where he uploads cool videos that show off his lifestyle and in the same promote AWOL.

Here's one of his cool videos 🙂

AWOL Academy has different courses for both newbies and advanced marketers

If you have an existing online business this platform will help you scale it up fast.

If you are a newbie AWOL Academy will help you get started starting with setting up an affiliate website, creating sales funnels and more.

There are different courses each one needs to be purchased separately.

Here are the courses available at AWOL Academy with their respective prices

1) AWOL 101 Coaching = $99

AWOL 101 is the introduction product at AWOL Academy, if you sign to AWOL Academy you're forced to get started with AWOL 101.

The price of AWOL 101 is $99.

This course is designed to give you an action plan that is specific to you.

After you take this course you will have a clear idea of what type of online business is for you.

AWOL 101 Coaching includes:

• Deep dive surveys & Questionnaires
• Business planning session
• 1 on 1 call

If you purchase AWOL 101 coaching you will get another product called Pro Academy (which costs $99) for free.

1) Master Class Workshop Webinar = Free

Master Class Workshop is a 2 hours long webinar where Keala Kanae talks about how to make money online.

The webinar is free but Keala advertises it on Youtube to get more clients, but many people are complaining about this "free webinar" because Keala keeps talking about free money making opportunities and then he start promoting some VERY Expensive products by the end of the webinar.

He even guarantees you in the webinar to earn $10k in 3 months.

Here's a video from an annoyed member that rants about the free master class workshop webinar.

1) The Awaken 219 Live Events = $597

The Awaken 219 live events focus on improving your self and your business, this event is expensive but in my opinion, it's worth it because you get to work with successful entrepreneurs and get to meet people with your same goal.

You will learn how to improve your mindset which is the most important thing in business and life.

The event is 3 days long and you will get to meet Todd Campbell who is going to be your instructor along with Keala Kanae.

Awaken 219 costs $597 and it does not offer a refund.

1) Internet Income Explained = $49

This course costs $49 and it's going to teach the basics of internet marketing, there are 4 videos that explain thing how online business work, how online sales are processed and stuff like that.

To be honest with you, you can learn all of this on Google for free without paying $49.

2) AWOL Pro Academy = $99

Pro Academy is a course that will teach you how to create sales funnels and email campaigns. You will learn how to build a website that generates leads using email marketing & affiliate marketing.

You will also have a conversion tracking system that will track conversions for you

AWOL Pro Academy training comes in 4 modules which are the following:

• Module 1: in 6 videos you will learn some basic stuff like how affiliate marketing works, intro to paid traffic and how to set up your site domain.
• Module 2: This module comes with 12 videos where you learn how to create a sales funnel, a landing page and an autoresponder you're also recommended to use some specific tools to the job for you.
• Module 3: In 3 videos Keala will show you how to sign up for affiliate programs & how to promote them using solo ads.
• Module 4: In this module Mr.Kanae talks about email marketing testing and tweaking tricks to increase your conversions.

I think AWOL Pro Academy is worth it because the information provided in this course is gold.

Keala explains affiliate marketing, email marketing and solo ads in an easy very clear way, he even gives you month by month case studies which are really good.

However, if you want to learn everything there are more products to buy and that comes with some heavy prices as well, I'm going to give you some info about them as well.

3) Inbox Academy = $447

Inbox Academy is a course that focuses more on email marketing only

It will teach you how to increase your subscribers how to encourage them to open your emails more and convert more.

There is a lot of great information here but in my opinion, $447 is a lot of money to pay for this.

The Inbox Academy course is structured like this:

• Module 1: The email marketing basics
• Module 2: Email delivery
• Module 3 & 4: email open rate & CTR.

4) Conversion Academy Course = $1,797

This course will teach you the best way to increase conversions when writing articles or when you're writing follow up sequences on your email campaigns.

I know this course is very expensive but what they teach you is worth every penny.

If you master storytelling you will definitely make most of your site's visitors convert.

But in my opinion, AWOL Academy could have made an all in one course instead of selling each course separately which amounts to big sums of money.

This is obviously done to earn more from the members.

This course comes with 6 modules:

• Module 1: Story Telling Techniques
• Module 2: hacks to control your readers mind
• Module 3: live sales formula
• Module 4: evergreen sales formula
• Module 5: what are high ticket sales
• Module 6: tracking your affiliate campaigns.

5) Traffic Academy = $2,797

All the above courses are useless if you don't buy this course first.

Traffic (website visitors) is the first thing you need before anything else.

I think Keala shows you this course later because he wants you to buy the first courses first and then be like.

" Hey you learned how to create email campaigns and how to convert them but I need visitors! Here is traffic Academy for $2,797!"

Then you will have no choice but buy this course as well.

With Traffic Academy course you will learn how to drive traffic from Youtube, Facebook, Instagram and the most popular search engines like Google, Yahoo & Bing.

In the last module of this course, Keala mentions CPA marketing and how it can boost your earnings.

6) Masters Academy = $5,497

This course is a bit different as it's about money management. When you make money you will learn how to invest it effectively and how to do tax planning.

There are also other things included in the course like the mindset hacks and some motivational stuff.

This course costs $5,497 and it's divided into three modules:

1. Mindset Hacks
2. Wealth Strategies
3. Solopreneur to CEO.

7) AWOL Elite Lite = $11,997/year

AWOL Elite lite is a mentoring program, each week you can attend a 2 hours long webinar where you can ask Kameron Goerge and Keala live your burning questions.

You also have the opportunity to get your landing pages, ads, funnels reviewed by Keala who will also give you recommendations, tips, and an action plan to improve your business.

I understand how good this mentoring program is and how gold it is but in my honest opinion charging $11,997 EVERY year for this is crazy.

I'm curious to know your opinion on this, make sure you leave your comments in the comments section.

8) AWOL Community = $49.97/month

Well the AWOL Community is nothing but just a Facebook group where you can ask questions.

You have to pay $49.97/month to get access to this Facebook group.

It sounds ridiculous to pay 50 bucks for a Facebook group but your questions are going to be answered by some top internet marketers and Keala Kanae is one of them 😉

6) AWOL Elite = $17,997/year

By paying $17,997 every year you will get all the products listed above but with a great bonus.

You will get extra support from the owners Keala & George. You will also have the right to attend their weekly live webinars to ask them your burning questions.

With AWOL Elite you also get tickets to the Elite Summit & the Awaken events.

As you can see the AWOL Academy courses are very expensive in my opinion. Each course needs to be bought separately and each course completes the other one.

To get started you will need to buy the AWOL Academy 101 Coaching package which will cost you $99.

You can also join directly using their official website

There are also other ways to join, if you join using someone else link you will get a free PDF by Keala Kanae called Freelance marketing secrets.

If you're interested in AWOL Academy it's normal that you want to read what the other members are saying about it.

There are mixed reviews about AWOL Academy there are success stories & negative reviews.

Here's a video of some AWOL Academy success stories I found on Youtube.

Well, to be honest with you, these success stories look suspicious to me, maybe because I review scams all the time that use fake testimonials. 🙂

Below I have included some screenshots positive & negative reviews from members.

You can read all the reviews on the following sites:

• SiteJabber
• Yelp
• Reddit

1) You Can Get a Refund!

If you buy any of the AWOL Academy courses and you feel like they are not for you.

You can ask for a refund as they offer a 14 days no questions asked guarantee

This is something great because there are many programs out there like Mobe that make refunds hard and tricky

2) The Training is Great

I know that their training is expensive as it's designed to make you spend a lot of money but the quality is outstanding and more importantly, the training is updated and works.

The training is perfect for both beginners & experienced marketers.

Here's how the AWOL Academy back office looks like:

3) The AWOL Academy Coaching is Gold

The coaching feature only comes when you spend $11k for the AWOL elite.

But asking Keala and his friend whenever you want is priceless and definitely going to help you succeed!

The live webinars are gold, they also have a great forum with lots of information that you will find useful for sure.

4) Good BBB Rating

AWOL Academy has 5 positive reviews and only one complaint at BBB.

They have a good B+ rating, which is a good sign.

As you can read above the BBB rating of AWOL Academy is B+ but today in 2019 the rating went down to B and not B+ anymore.

The complaints have increased so much from 1 complaint to 18 complaints.

Most of the complaints are about Refunds.

5) Generous Affiliate Program

If you want to promote AWOL Academy you will need to pay a monthly fee of $35 and buy a course of your choice.

If people buy any course at AWOL Academy using your link, you will earn 30% of each sale except for AWOL PRO Academy which will earn you 60% of commissions.

The 2 Tier Affiliate Program

The AWOL Academy affiliate program is a a 2 tier it means that if you refer an affiliate to the program you will earn 5% on all the sales generated by the affiliate you have referred.

Just last year you could earn only 3% of all the sales you referral generates, not it went up to 5% which is good.

I guess this increase in commissions happened because the prices of the AWOL products went up.

6) Good Customers Support Team

AWOL Academy offers really good support for all the members.

If you have any issue you can contact the support team and they will reply you within a few hours or less.

You can contact the support team by using their toll-free number or email.

There is also a support team available for members from Europe.

1) Very High Prices

Even though the training is good, the prices are really high.

I think the only course that has a reasonable price is Pro Academy ($99).

The other courses are exaggeratedly priced!

​For examples, AWOL Elite & AWOL Elite lite are really overpriced!

$17,997 every year? what the hell?

​That's a yearly salary that many people don't even have!

​With AWOL Academy even the Facebook group has a monthly membership of $49.79.

Just like one member said you gotta be rich to get rich with AWOL Academy!

2) No FREE Trial 

Since the products are crazy expensive, it makes sense to have a free trial, but unfortunately, there are no free trials at AWOL Academy!

But they have a PDF called Freelance Marketing Secrets where they kind of give you a taste of what you can expect to learn from the AWOL Academy products but it's information is vague and does not show you the back office!

3) It's All About Recruiting Others (A Pyramid Scheme?)

It seems like AWOL Academy focuses more on teaching you how to recruit other members.

There are lots of complaints online from AWOL users saying that the training continually pushes them to promote the same opportunity.

This is really bad because most people that promote AWOL Academy are doing it ONLY for the commissions, most of them did not go through the training

This sounds like an MLM or a pyramid scheme where there are no real products and the main goal is to refer affiliates that refer other affiliates.

4) Focus on Paid Traffic (SO RISKY!)

I understand that paid traffic is the fastest way to get targeted visitors, but your paid ads campaigns need to be PERFECT in order to pay off.

We all know that paid traffic from Facebook Ads or solo ads is crazy expensive and it's SO easy to burn thousands of dollars if you do it wrong.

Paid traffic is something that ANY newbie should avoid otherwise you're going to burn all your money.

5) Lots of Upsells

As I said before AWOL is designed to sell you all of their products gradually.

After buying the first two courses you will find yourself forced to buy the next course and so on.

If you are a newbie and have a limited budget you might end up spending some big money and still find yourself needing more courses.

As I said above, Keala could EASILY make all these courses one course and have a like a small monthly or yearly fee instead of charging like $60,000 for all the products!

6) There are Even More Expenses!

First AWOL focuses on teaching you how to buy traffic which is an extra cost.

You will need to invest at least $400 per month in paid traffic.

To apply what you are taught on the training you will need to pay monthly fees for some products like:

•  LeadPages ($48/month) 
• GetResponse ($15/month) 
• ClickMagick ($17/month)
• Domain name ($15/year)
• Hosting ($30/month)

7) You Have To Pay To Become An Affiliate

Most affiliate programs out there are free of charge and offer good commissions which are even higher than the AWOL Academy commissions.

To become an affiliate of AWOL Academy you have to pay an EXTRA $40 per month.

But as an affiliate you will get training on how to promote AWOL Academy but the downside of that everyone gets access to the same training which will result in lots of competition and oversaturation.

Especially when you think about how hard it is to convince people to purchase sun an expensive program.

The products are ALREADY expensive, with AWOL Academy you have to even pay for the oxygen you breathe!

8) Are You Guaranteed to Earn $10k in 90 Days?

One of the biggest income claims that AWOL Academy gives you is the guarantee to earn $10k in 3 months.

This is done just to persuade you into spending money on their products, no one can predict someone else earnings let alone guaranteeing success or a specific number!

However, there is something you need to do to be eligible for this $10k guarantee.

• You will need to spend $11k on the AWOL Elite!
• Listen to 20-30 minutes long audio files related to business & motivation.
• Read (books & articles they recommend) every day for 30 minutes.
• Email your list every day
• Spend money on Paid traffic.
• Be Active on the AWOL Academy Community daily (which has a monthly fee)

As you can see you need to spend more than $11,000 in order to be guaranteed to earn $10,000 within 90 days!

• Good & high-quality training for newbies & experienced people.
• Kanae knows what he is talking about.
• Ability to contact the founders.
• Good affiliate program

• Tons of upsells
• CRAZY costs! (Just the email marketing training costs over $5,000!)
• No free trial
• Hard to get a refund!

AWOL Academy is definitely a legitimate opportunity their training is really good and will help you start a profitable business if you follow it to a tee.

However, Keala has exaggerated the pricing this program is extremely expensive, there is no guarantee to make money.

You could waste money without earnings, also I had a hard time finding some AWOL Academy success stories.

Luckily they have a good 14 days money back guarantee, if you don't like the training, you will get a refund. 

I have updated the review and I have explained how lots of members are complaining about getting refunds from AWOL Academy is very hard.

Some members even claim that they did not get any refund even though it was requested before the 14 days trial!

AWOL Academy is for you if:

• You have $28,000 laying around to invest in this program.

In my opinion, starting an online business should not be that expensive.

There are many great online business training platforms that cost way less.

If you need help Here's the Training I Recommend for Newbies

It's a lot cheaper than AWOL Academy but it includes everything you need to start a profitable business online.

Here's how it compares with AWOL Academy.

Pricing:

First of all AWOL Academy offers no free trial, Wealthy Affiliate does.

AWOL Academy is EXTREMELY expensive, the email marketing training alone is over $5,000!!

The whole Wealthy Affiliate training costs $49/month and you literally get everything the community has to offer!

Training:

the AWOL Academy training is VERY good, I have no doubts on that, but the Wealthy Affiliate training is second to none!

Kyle the co-founder of WA has a great teaching style exactly like Keala Kanae.

The difference here is AWOL Academy training is good for both newbies and experienced people while the Wealthy Affiliate training is perfect for newbies.

To see the difference and what you have been missing just click on the button below to get the first lesson for free!