Kevin David Net Worth | Con artist or genius?
Kevin David is one of the biggest names in the online entrepreneurial space. He commands an enormous YouTube channel, has experience with Amazon FBA, Shopify and ClickFunnels. However, most of his wealth and popularity seems to emanate from his highly controversial (and expensive) training programs.
So, how much is he worth?
Kevin David’s net worth is estimated to be $4 to $20 million. This valuation considers his multiple streams of income including affiliate marketing, Amazon FBA, Shopify, YouTube and training courses.
While it’s hard to dispute the guy is clearly making a lot of money, the majority of it comes from his digital courses. He made $10 million in 17 months (source) flogging his training. Making him the most successful online ‘guru’ ever.
But is he selling unobtainable dreams?
Who is Kevin David?
He currently markets himself as a 7 figure CEO, founder and e-commerce coach. But that wasn’t always the case.
Kevin David has been an entrepreneur since the age of 14. He grew up in the suburbs of Eugene, Oregon playing soccer. His passion for the sport taught him valuable lessons about competition, hard work, and the art of winning.
He always knew that he was destined to be an entrepreneur… Despite his young age, Kevin opted into every business opportunity he could find whether that was selling Baseball Cards or candy bars.
Years later, Kevin began traveling and creating gaming apps & website blogs learning how to Monetize using the Amazon Affiliate Program and Google Ad Sense. He had some success, but nothing would compare to what was to come
-OfficialKevinDavid.com
After graduating from college, he began working as an Accountant in Oregon. Before long, he grew tired of this and bagged a job at Facebook as a Private Consultant.
The Zuck clearly didn’t provide the stimulus Kevin required. One night working late, he discovered the world of Amazon FBA. Apparently, he started to cash in upwards of $1000 per week after 30 days with his first private label product. As someone who uses the Amazon FBA channel myself, this seems achievable, especially considering this was around 5 years ago.
After his first year selling on Amazon, Kevin banked $2.1 million in profit.
He went on to build his brand, THATLifestyleNinja. Began to teach on YouTube how to be successful like him, first with Amazon FBA and later with Shopify.
He also managed to grow his Facebook community into the largest in the world. However, this can be largely attributed to shady and immoral growth tactics. I discuss this later in more detail.
At the same time, he started to release some digital online training courses. Kevin went on to win two awards with ClickFunnels – the first, for making over one million dollars with one funnel. He later went on to win the 2-comma club X award, an award is given to entrepreneurs who rustle up over $10 million using a single sales funnel.
Let’s break down how he did it.
How does Kevin David make money and how much does he make?
Like any successful entrepreneur, Kevin utilised multiple streams of income to build his net worth quickly and effectively.
From my research, his main streams of income are as follows:
- Affiliate marketing
- Selling physical products using Amazon FBA
- Dropshipping physical products using Shopify
- Digital training courses
- AdSense from YouTube videos
Affiliate marketing
In short, online affiliate marketing is the practice of marketing someone else’s product to an audience and receiving a commission if sales are made through your link. He makes money using various techniques like:
- Running Facebook ads with an offer, this redirects to a landing page where the user decides to buy and is further redirected to a ClickFunnels product page.
- Providing links to software used for Shopify or Amazon FBA businesses. For example, Jungle Scout or Helium10. He makes sure to promote these services in his courses and in his YouTube videos.
- He originally sold his digital course with the help of his own affiliates through ClickFunnels to the tune of 8 figures in less than 2 years.
I highly doubt Kevin continues to run smaller affiliate offers with the torrent of cash that his courses provide. However, I would estimate that links to software on his YouTube and in his course would provide around:
Total: $3000-$5000 per month.
Amazon FBA
The platform that granted him his initial success. In simplistic terms, the business model sees you purchasing products in bulk and sending them to an Amazon warehouse. Here, Amazon provides the fulfillment services – making the endeavour very ‘hands-off’. I have a guide to getting started with Amazon FBA here if this has piqued your interest.
Kevin was supposedly making upwards of $1000 profit per day with Amazon FBA. At which point he started to teach on YouTube. Although, the level of success he actually achieved is in question, with evidence of faked earnings doing the rounds (see controversies below).
Personal opinions of him aside, I learnt some good information for free from his YouTube channel when I was starting my Amazon FBA business. For fairness I will link this below:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_MTE8H-i_spop-Gc9tOCDQ
If we take his word for it, his max earnings on the platform are likely to be no higher than he advertises. However, as an Amazon FBA seller myself, I know that you are not always selling at your peak. Let’s reduce that by a third to likely represent a more accurate average (although I think it’s probably half of that again).
Total: $20,000 per month.
Shopify
While I don’t doubt Kevin makes some money from dropshipping stores using Shopify. The evidence of his success is hard to come by. In a world of online fakery, it’s hard at the best of times to ascertain whether the information source is valid. However, Kevin has yet to prove through screenshots or video, any success with his stores.
Of course, this doesn’t stop him from selling expensive training on how to do it!
Total: $???
Digital training courses
The big one. Digital products are such a brilliant thing to sell as they have few overheads (no physical product), no stock management and are very easy to scale. With this comes extremely high profit margins which closely resemble the revenue figures minus marketing costs.
According to his website, Kevin has 509,547 ‘ninjas’ or members on his books. While not all of these will have purchased a course. I would estimate many thousands have. If we consider that his most popular Amazon FBA course costs $1997, if a mere 1000 people sign up that’s $2,000,000 right off the bat.
He now even sells courses teaching you how to sell courses. Mind blown. You certainly can’t argue with his sales and marketing skills.
So some numbers, he made $2.1 million from his Amazon course in roughly 1.5 years.
$2,100,000 / 18 = $116,700 per month. Assuming he does 2/5 of those numbers on a regular basis gives a better average of:
Total: $46,680 per month.
YouTube
At the time of writing, Kevin has 800k subscribers on YouTube, no mean feat. Consequently, I’d wager this is his second largest income stream. How does he monetise his channel?
Firstly, AdSense. For a channel 800k in size, let’s assume a CPM for the US of $6-8. If we consider the average to be $7. This means an advertiser will pay between $7 per 1000 video views. However, YouTube (Google) take 45% which leaves $3.85 per 1000 views.
If we estimate that all of his subscribers and no one else watches each new video (a conservative estimate).
Then we get 800,000 / 1000 x 3.85 = $3080 per video.
6 videos per month gives, $3080 x 6 = $18,480 per month.
These figures are excluding any sponsorship and brand collaborations that he certainly does. I couldn’t possibly guess how much extra income this would generate for him as there are too many variables. Let’s just say it’s enough to keep him off the streets.
Should you add to his wealth and take one of his courses?
I have never taken Kevin David’s course, or any other paid online course. Therefore, you are welcome to totally discount my opinion.
Notwithstanding the above, I would suggest you steer clear of this one, due to the unusually large aura of fakery and customer discontent. Many suggest his course is merely a direct copy of other pre-existing Amazon FBA courses, I can’t back that claim up, but these claims originate for a reason.
Additionally, there are a large number of affiliates for his courses, making doing due diligence on the matter rather tricky! Even his Trustpilot page seems to be largely 5-star reviews from new accounts…
However, he does provide some useful beginners information for FREE on his YouTube channel which I would actually recommend viewing. I hasten to add that you should take most things with a pinch of salt, and you should remind yourself where agendas and sponsorships likely factor.
If you would prefer to make your own conclusions, I will link a few third party course reviews below.
Kevin David course reviews
Unfortunately, it’s very hard to find any reviews of his courses from someone that isn’t working as an affiliate for him. Hopefully, this is a good mix of opinion:
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/officialkevindavid.com
Controversies
Shady Facebook group growth
Kevin grew his Facebook group, THATLifestyleNinja, to become the largest Facebook community in the world (source). This was done however, using unethical techniques.
People have reported receiving many friend requests from random Facebook profiles. If you accepted any, you would immediately be added to Kevin’s Facebook groups. This drastically increased and inflated the size of the group.
Now, the first thing to do would be to not accept friend requests from strangers! But some people are far more trusting of others than sceptical old me.
Shady phone calls to course customers
Similarly, many report phone calls from ‘Amazon employees’ etc asking for money to fix issues and the like. The only conclusion I can draw is that Kevin David was/is selling his customer’s information to third parties. This puts them at risk to scams and phishing attempts while he gets paid handsomely no doubt. This is a HUGE red flag for the credibility of this ‘guru’.
Faked amazon revenue screenshot
Probably his biggest blunder. Sending revenue screenshots to his course members as proof of his success. However, in this one, he has forgotten to include the comma in his sales… Come on Kevin, sloppy job.
There are also complaints of modified screenshots of his ClickFunnels earnings AND fiddling of HTML to modify the figures displayed on web pages.
No Shopify store revenue proof
With no evidence of good success with his Shopify stores, I feel he may not be so brilliant at it. Certified to be teaching others for the price of thousands of dollars? Unlikely.
Poor advice in his Amazon FBA course
I’m led to believe he may have now addressed this. However, he was advising in his course that you should use Facebook review groups to amass product reviews. Not only will this get your seller account banned. It’s just terrible advice that is setting people up to fail. Simply, offer a GOOD PRODUCT that serves the buyer and you will naturally receive good reviews. This is the real ‘secret’ to a successful, long term and coherent business.
Terrible course refund process
There are countless examples of course members being unable to claim their ‘100% money-back guarantee’.
Additionally, he seems to permanently have massive course discounts, great right? Well not if you read the small print on his website…
‘All discounted purchases are non-refundable’. Ah so maybe that discount wasn’t just him being generous.
While I’m at it, I’ve just noticed he even uses spammy marketing tools on his website. Including a very spammy looking pop-up from Katie…
Funnily enough, Katie works on a number of websites…
This is likely just an app/plugin but still, no sign of professionalism here – another red flag for me.
Copyrighting his own name
Upon scrutiny from fellow YouTubers, Kevin has attempted to file lawsuits to anyone creating videos that speak badly of him or his training. He has done this by copyrighting his own name (I don’t know if this is even possible). Any video that he doesn’t like, he threatens the author with legal action for use of his copyright. Clever.
My opinion
Honestly, I was a fan of Kevin a few years ago when he was providing some good value with his YouTube videos. I trusted him as one of the better teachers, and wouldn’t have hesitated to recommend his content as a resource.
However, with all the controversies surrounding his training courses and unethical marketing tactics. I would be doing a disservice to anyone if I recommended him now.
I reiterate that I have never taken his course, so feel free to take my opinion as unfounded. But with the information available for free online, I struggle to see the benefit of paying for it.
Parting thoughts
I hope this post has provided not only Kevin David’s net worth, but also an unbiased opinion on his training courses and practices. The further into my research I got however, the more and more sure I became that you should avoid him like the plague.
Spend your money on releasing products not on courses. You will learn much more from spending $1997 releasing a product and failing, than you will watching a few videos for the same money. I hope this helps!
Take care,
Read more about Amazon FBA courses here.
MVMT Watches on Shopify case study
21 Replies to “Kevin David Net Worth | Con artist or genius?”
Thank you for this. I was close to joining his course. I’ve been watching many YouTube videos on how to tap into the FBA market. I’m a virgin to Amazon and very curious. I’ve taken many notes, now just to take bits and pieces from others and help me put it all together.
Most welcome Donna – good luck going forward!
Kevin kicked me out of his private course after being in there for 2 years. I noticed he sells pagonify and marketing magic and in his update course to have his student use them but 99% of those student failed and posted in the group. well.. those posts only lasted 1-2 hours before his VA (virtual assistant) deleted them. i gone out my way to teach some of them and was eventually muted then kicked out. so… if anyone goes against his teaching in his course, he will kick you out.
Thank you for this very valuable indeed in a world where scammers are the middle man.
Welcome Kara!
I tried to ask for refund at the Day 12 after I purchased, the CS replied as I have gone through more than 40% of the content, no refund will be processed.
I don’t know that was on the T&C, I haven’t read that before I purchased as the video said it is 100% refund within 14 days.
What should I do now?
Hi Karen,
I’m sorry to hear of your troubles! I don’t know the specific T&C’s for his courses but I can tell you that this small print condition is often present in these products. I would imagine this 40% threshold will supersede any 100% refund rights. I would keep badgering for a refund on the grounds that it was unclear, as there is nothing to lose.
Perhaps this is an unfortunate and hard-learned lesson for the future – I have been caught out by similar things in the past!
Thank you for commenting, hopefully this may stop others from reaching the same fate.
Good luck with it and all the best on your Amazon journey.
Thanks for the review. Just spent 2 hrs listening and had my cc in hand and ready to order, but decided to do a little research and I’m glad I did.
Lex,
No problems!
In your humble opinion, who if any are the liget “FBA educator.”
Hi Jim,
While I don’t necessarily think what these people teach is wrong, I believe most people are better off using free resources and saving this money for their first order instead.
A good place to start would be: The Million Dollar Case Study by Jungle Scout on YouTube and ‘Project X’ by Helium 10 on YouTube. Additionally, Helium 10 offers a comprehensive course for free with a subscription to their software, which I would value as essential as it is.
Hope this helps!
Wow, I just watch his 3 hours training course yestersay which was supposed to be 2 hours. And I have to tell you it was an amazing sell pitch, and I would have fell for it deeper if I wasn’t a sells person myself and even with my experience I still end up paying $84.00 for an Agency course. I swear to you I was so excited to start and pay the full $1997.00 but something told me to hold on and keep watching, and I dont know if you remember on the sale pitch he said only the first 30 people that sign up will get this and that. So I waited and towards the end he opened that same sale pitch again for another half hour. Smh. That’s the part that made me wanted to look into him more and I saw your link and started reading and you don’t know how much I appreciate you man. You Saved me a load of money. And that $1997.00 USD would have cost me close to 3K CAD.
I haven’t seen his marketing tactics first hand but they sound familiar!
A fantastic salesman no doubt – I’m glad to provide a different perspective (hopefully the more sensible one).
If you are looking for a bit of guidance I would recommend The Million Dollar Case Study by Jungle Scout and Project X by Helium 10, both free on youtube.
Good luck!
Hi, he is now selling a business with $45000 start up investment. My friend has signed up to this business.. he basically gets you to set up an Amazon business and runs it for you. he takes 30% of profits and business. do you know anything about this venture as after reading this i am worried about my friends investment.
Hi Michael,
Not heard of this one before so can’t comment specifically on it. However, I can foresee a lot more cons than pros with this approach.
Your friend could start an Amazon business with less than $2000, I would argue that even if your friend didn’t see success first time, the learning and lower risk would make this a better option.
Perhaps something to consider!
Hi, he has a Amazon business with me. We currently only have 1 product but it does ok. This other venture is being sold with the promise of them running it and you sit back and watch the cash roll in.
That sounds far too good to be true. Effectively then, they are running the business but are choosing to give away part of the profits to your friend, when they could run it without your friend and keep all the profit.
This would only make sense to me if they were struggling for capital investment i.e. the $45,000. But if they are so good at this, why do they not have $45,000?
If he decides to risk it, I wish him well however, it sounds nonsensical to me!
I heard of this how is your friends store doing
You have no idea how you just saved my life, 1997USD may seem little but it’s actually a lot of money in my currency.
I was thinking if I should follow up with the guy, but now thanks to your review I’m on another different perspective now, I really appreciate your review, but say other than blogging do you know any other way to make money online
this is a new psychological marketing technique to draw interest into gaining quick wealth easily. Your mind gets sucked into the idea & you fall hook line & sinker into it!! Talking ABOUT THE COURSES HERE!!