Review of BookWise – Are Personal Development and Wealth Creation possible at the same time?

As a personal development blogger, I am no stranger to the fact that people appreciate empowering and motivating content, and I am happy to continue to provide that type of content.

However, at the same, as far back as early 2007 I started talking about the fact that if all people do is read blogs – but then don’t use what they learn – that there will be very little improvement in people’s lives. Reading is great and it should be an integral part of anyone’s growth strategy. However, gaining knowledge without putting that knowledge to practical use in your life will not produce results!

I was recently approached about the BookWise business opportunity, and was given the impression that the system was focused on helping people to create wealth, but that their wealth was created by them consistently using real-world personal and professional growth strategies.

That was enough for me to give BookWise a quick look, and that “quick” look ended up being a very thorough overview of the company, their business model, their offerings, and their ability to help people to grow both personally, as well as in the financial sector. 

Overall, I was impressed. A home-based business model that focuses on growth and empowerment in order to achieve financial success? Sign me up!

Signing up is exactly what I did, and I spent the better part of the next 2 days going through the initial BookWise training, and finding out everything that I could about the company and the opportunity that they represent.

The following text is the result of those efforts, and I would ask you to quickly ask yourself these questions before you read on:

1. Am I interested in making a consistent effort to use proven success principles in order to grow as a person, as well as a financially successful business owner?
2. Am I simply a reader who isn’t ready for or interested in owning a business?

There is no right or wrong answer to those questions, and the following review of BookWise is both in-depth and useful, and it also gives a great overview of the BookWise learning opportunity, as well as the BookWise business.

If you are not interested in that, then feel free to become a Preferred Customer at the Today is that Day BookWise store in order to get discounted books. However, don’t waste your time reading this extensive review if a business opportunity based on personal and business growth is not something that you are interested in.

BookWise was founded by several very high profile individuals who actually know about the business concepts that BookWise is founded on. A great idea for a business is simply a great idea if it is not backed up by people who can actually turn that idea into a reality. In the case of BookWise, the idea was forged into a powerful business model by some very successful individuals, including all of the following: 

• Richard Paul Evans: #1 bestselling author, and recipient of the Ernst & Young Lifetime Achievement Award (One of Paul’s books, The 5 lessons a Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth comes with BookWise membership)
• Robert G. Allen: Bestselling author, lecturer, and co-founder of the Enlightened Wealth Institute.
• Dennis Webb: Author, lecturer, co-founder of FranklinQuest (a half-billion dollar company)
• Mark Hurst: Former chief of brand planning for DDB (the largest advertising agency in the world)
• Blair Williams: Former chief systems architect for FranklinQuest
• Andy Compas: Former U.S. general manager of Unicity

As I was doing my research into the BookWise offering, I found that most of the features and benefits of being a BookWise associate fell into one of the following 4 categories:

Owning your Own Business

For those of you whose primary interest is owning your own home-based business that supplies residual income to your home or lifestyle, this section is for you. All of the following benefits and training opportunities are immediately available to all new associates via archived teleseminars and webcasts, or upcoming training that happens each and every week.

• Webcast – Weekly webcasts that discuss topics such as building your BookWise team, marketing your bookstore, and becoming a strong leader. Archived editions of this webcast are available for all associates as soon as they sign up. (One file I checked out from the archives repeatedly talked about the fact that the business needed to bring value to anyone signing up, and that it is the responsibility of present members to ensure that was the case. I was very impressed with that, and it is most assuredly not “standard” network marketing fare.)
• Weekly Mentor Teleclasses – Mentoring via telephone from experts in the fields of wealth accumulation, tax strategies, success principles, and publishing strategies. These teleclasses are a HUGE reason to join BookWise in order to gain real-world strategies and put them to immediate use in your life. (These calls are held by the same successful people who founded BookWise to begin with, including both Richard Paul Evans and Robert Allen.)
• AIM Training: Accelerate. Innovate. Motivate. – These are monthly updates and trainings from the BookWise Corporate office, and they are also archived on the site. (These types of calls are invaluable in growing your business, staying motivated, and learning more about the company so that you can share that information with others.)
• Matching Commissions – This is an amazing benefit that is only offered by BookWise. Whenever you get commissions as a result of people signing up in your organization, the company matches the commissions that you generate 100%. In other words, BookWise lets you earn money by introducing people to the business, and then they give you a dollar for dollar match for all of your commissions, e.g. – If you make $500 in commissions, the company will give you an additional $500.
• QuickWise Training – Simple and fun online training program that is available immediately to all new associates. Hosted by founders Robert Allen and Richard Paul Evans, this training does a great job of explaining the ins and outs of your BookWise business, and how to get started. (In addition, this training focused a lot on having a proper mindset, which I was very impressed with.) 
• PresidentWise Training – Hosted by Robert Allen, this weekly teleseminar is focused 100% on teaching you how to grow your BookWise business by helping people to see the true value represented by the opportunity, and by the BookWise organization itself. There is a large repository of these training calls already at the site that are immediately available to new associates.
• Marketing Center – A large repository of marketing material in order to help you quickly build your BookWise business. The marketing center includes many different graphics to be used on the Internet, BookWise letterhead and business cards, logos, promotiona
  l videos, brochures, and flyers. 

Knowledge

For the people who are most interested in the personal growth and development aspect of BookWise, here are some of the main benefits to being a BookWise Associate. Each of these benefits are free to all associates, and most are available immediately after signing up:

• Successful People Seminar – This is a 2-day, LIVE transformational seminar taught by experts in relationships, wealth and personal growth. This seminar is valued at $995 and is FREE to BookWise associates.
• TaxWin – An invaluable, live, monthly mentoring program that teaches you how to take advantage of home-business tax breaks so that you keep your profits. Recordings of past calls are archived at the site and available immediately to all new associates. 
• Book of the Month – Each month you can choose any book from the massive BookWise library, or you can simply read the book of the month, which is a success book chosen by the company founders. If you choose the book of the month, on the first Tuesday of the following month, that book is discussed in a free teleclass, usually with the author of the book. In addition a monthly eBook and a monthly audio book book are included with site membership. The eBook and audio book are chosen from the BookWise library of over 100 of the greatest literary works ever written. For example, this month’s selections include titles such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Iliad, and Beowulf.
• Wisdom Link – Access more than 100,000 source documents used by such universities as Stanford and Yale – and Presidential speech writers at the White House. The massive database is easily searched and is also broken down into the following categories: Philosophy & Religion, World History, Science & Mathematics, Political Science & Law, Literature, U.S. History, Social Science, and Literature.
• Free Speed Reading Lesson -Could you read a hundred words a minute faster while actually comprehending and retaining more? Membership includes a powerful, free speed reading lesson, as well as a link to speed-reading courses that can help you improve your reading speed even more.

One of the many benefits to being a BookWise associate or a preferred customer is the money that you can save on books that you would have been buying anyway – especially if you are interested in personal growth and development. If you or the people in your household read even one or two books per month, the BookWise discounts will more than pay for the price of membership:

• Your own customizable Internet bookstore – Your own purchases through your bookstore are at a savings of up to 42% off the retail price of books, CD’s, and even DVD’s.
• Preferred Customer Program – Customers can sign up for the Preferred Customer program at your bookstore and receive the same discount that you get, which is a huge incentive for people to make their book, CD, and DVD purchases through your site. (I had my site set up and running in less than 5 minutes – Today is that Day BookWise store)

Authoring

Many bloggers and readers are also interested in becoming fully-fledged authors, and for those people, BookWise really lives up to its name. The benefits of BookWise membership for present or potential authors are staggering, and include all of the following:

• BookWise Bestseller Seminar – All associates receive 2 FREE Tickets to the BookWise Bestseller Seminar. This seminar is the most prestigious writer’s event in America, and the tickets are normally $995 each. For anyone who wants to become an author, this seminar is an invaluable tool for doing so.
• AuthorWise – A monthly teleseminar with Richard Paul Evans where the main topic of conversation is how to become a self-published author.
• WriteWise – For writers who are passionate and motivated, BooKWise has developed WriteWise™, a step by step program to assist writers in editing, publishing and marketing their books. This program is valued at over $15,000, yet is available at a deep discount for BookWise associates who are selected to participate. Benefits include all of the following:
• Learn about InfoPreneuring with 8 weekly mentoring calls.
• Receive intensive training by attending the WriteWise Publishing Conference.
• Meet with graphic designers and illustrators.
• Create a detailed marketing plan for your book with tips from the professionals.
• Learn how to write press releases.
• You will be provided with a literary agent.
• The WriteWise editing staff will guide you through the process of refining your manuscript.
• Take advantage of professional copy layout and design.
• Choose from two customized cover designs for your book.
• An ISBN number is provided.
• Your book will benefit from an official BookWise review.
• Either Richard Paul Evans or Robert G. Allen will provide a foreword for your book.
• Be photographed with Richard Paul Evans and Robert G. Allen.
• Receive 50 soft cover professionally printed copies of your new book.
• Refine your communication skills with a mock media interview.
• Experience your first live interview via BookWise webcast.
• Your published book will be sold through the BookWise online catalog.
• Experts provide tips and suggestions for writing your biography.
• Your book may be featured as an online eBook through BookWise.
• Have a website created for the promotion of your book.
• Perfect your own :30 introduction.

In addition to the almost limitless list of benefits just mentioned, BookWise also has several great benefits that didn’t fit neatly into any of those 4 categories. They include: 

• Personal Charitable Donation – 1% of all purchases made through your bookstore go to charity
• Company Charitable Donation – 10% of all company profits go to charity
• Incentive trips awarded to top performers – Present incentive trip is via an easily attainable success mark, and is for a 5-day cruise in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. (Many network marketing companies have great trips, but it is also very difficult to attain the goals needed to go on those trips. The BookWise incentive trips are given to all members who apply themselves and have even reasonable success in the business.)
• Better Life Money Back Guarantee – If you don’t like the program after 12 months, you will be refunded 100% of the m
  onthly membership fees that you paid that year, but you still get to keep the books, and all of the training that you received via the seminars, webinars, and conference calls.

Congratulations! If you have made it this far, then you may have what it takes to be a BookWise Associate. One of the things that impressed me the most about BookWise is that they stress that their business is not about “making money” or about “building a downline”. BookWise only wants people in the company who are going to do what it takes to empower and improve their own lives, thus leading by example and making money by showing other people how to do the same.

If you think that you are one of those people, and you want more information about BookWise, then I invite you to contact me directly, and/or check out all of the following ways to learn more about the company:

• View this BookWise PowerPoint presentation (free viewer here). It is very short, yet gives you a ton of great information about the company. If, after watching the presentation, you want more information about joining BookWise, either contact me directly, or simply sign up at the Today is that Day Bookwise store.
• Go to WinningintheMargins.com for a very brief, yet information-packed overview of the BookWise business. Once there, you will need to put in “todayisthatday” (without the quotes) as your passkey in order to access the presentation. You will be given the opportunity after the presentation to either leave the site, or to ask for more obligation-free information.
• If you’re not quite sure that you want to jump in with both feet, but you would like to at least stay in the loop about BookWise, you can either sign up for the Today is that Day newsletter, and/or sign up for the preferred customer program at the Today is that Day BookWise store in order to remain in the Today is that Day circle of influence. 

Even if you decide that BookWise isn’t for you, I want to thank you for taking the time to read through this review of the opportunity, and to encourage you at any time in the future to let me know if I can help you in any way to understand what BookWise has to offer!