28/04/09. Interview with the admin of ImperialFinances

THE PROGRAM HAS STOPPED PAYING! PLEASE DON’T INVEST!

Hi everyone! Today I have an interview with Will Somon. He’s running a program that seems to be gaining in popularity by the day at the moment called ImperialFinances. Not without good reason I might add. ImperialFinances has proved to be a revelation to many online investors. It just goes to show what can be achieved with a little forward planning, a good idea, and an enthusiastic admin behind it. If you enjoy today’s interview you might wish to refer back to my recent review of the program published here.

I think Will covered just about everything here so there is little for me to add. Before we hear from him though I’ll just remind you that ImperialFinances is a short to medium term HYIP that pays from 115% to 160% interest on expiry on plans lasting from 10 to 30 days, 35% interest per week in a plan lasting 4 weeks, and most recently 1.5% interest per day for 30 days (this one returns your principal on expiry).

“1. Hi Will, please introduce yourself to the readers of money-news-online. Tell us about your own role within ImperialFinances. Who else is involved in managing the program with you? What can you tell us about your experience in running an online investment program?

Hello everybody. My name is Will Somon (friends simply call me Will), a 32 year old man from California. I work as a Private Client Adviser and Private Banker. This is my daily job, but in ImperialFinances I am the CEO and Team Manager.

There are 3 more people involved in ImperialFinances, because a quality program needs a lot of support. I couldn’t manage the program without the help of Rick, Diana and Nathan (more details about them on questions 2).

Honestly, I don’t have any experience in running any online investment programs, but I am learning. I’m doing my best to manage this program in a good way. I had the opportunity to become a business partner to an offshore bank 1 year ago, but I’ve refused. I had to stay with my wife and kid. This is why I came with the idea to create a small and private investment group in August 2008.

2. Can you give us some background information on ImperialFinances? How long have you been online? Are you running the site alone or do you have an assistant or business partner? What are you realistically hoping to achieve by launching this site?

Planning the ImperialFinances project started in March 2009, but the idea is a bit older. Everything started like a game, but we realized that we can sustain this for at least 6 months. I know this sounds a bit ridiculous but I’ll make this come true.

Program is now 16 days old and first payouts have already been made. Most of the payouts have been reinvested almost instantly and this makes us proud of ImperialFinances.

In question one I’ve introduced you to Rick, Diana and Nathan. Well now I’ll tell you what they do for ImperialFinances.

– Rick – you already met him on Live Chat. His duty is to take care of Live Chat and Support Requests from ImperialFinances. If there are emails that he doesn’t know the answer, he’ll forward them to me;
– Diana – she is one of the trader specialists;
– Nathan – Diana’s partner in trading sessions.
They are managing almost 80% of incoming funds, and 90% of our personal funds (the rest, 20% of incoming and 10% of personal funds, is a safe reserve in case of collapse. Impossible but we had to take these measures.)

They’re more than assistants or business partners: they’re my friends and I consider them equal with me. When ImperialFinances was launched I was confident that the program would be big. Well now, I am more than that. ImperialFinances is already a success and keeps growing. Despite the average returns, because there are many HYIPs with higher ROIs, people prefer a stable program that could last for more than 6 months. My dream is to make ImperialFinances last for more than 6 months. And I will do it. Of course with members’ support.

3. For those unfamiliar with online HYIPs can you explain how the process works? From the moment I decide to invest in ImperialFinances to the moment I get my first payout, what happens? What do I need to do before and after joining?

When you join a program and you make the first deposit, this assumes you know the risks involved. Because HYIP means High Yield Investment Program. With ImperialFinances we lowered the risks, because program is stable.

A simple guide to start your investment with us.

1) You must have at least $5 in your favorite payment processor (AlertPay, EcuMoney, LibertyReserve, PerfectMoney, StrictPay or SolidTrustPay).
2) Register your account with us, complete all required fields and check the info carefully, but always can be changed later.
3) Go to Make Deposit, choose your favorite plan, type in amount to invest, choose payment processor and click SPEND.
4) You’ll be redirected to your payment processor SCI (Shopping Cart Interface) to finish the transaction.
5) If your account is not credited instantly, send a support request with payment details and we will credit your account manually.

After you followed these steps you can promote ImperialFinances through your referral link. You will get a referral commission every time someone from your downline makes an investment.

4. What are the investment plans you are offering investors? What are the minimum and maximum amounts to invest? What payment processors are you currently dealing with? Are payouts automatic or do I need to request them?

We started ImperialFinances with 4 investment plans:
– 115% after 10 days;
– 135% after 20 days;
– 160% after 30 month;
– 35% weekly for 4 weeks – 140% total profit;
And yes, all plans have the principal included. Because this was the main question in almost 50% support requests.

After a few days, members requested another plan with daily payments. So after the members’ vote we have added 1.5% daily for 30 days + principal back, total profit will be 145% after 30 days.

Minimum investment is only $5, affordable for anyone in my opinion and up to $10,000. To invest in ImperialFinances it is very easy, because we accept payment through most popular payment gateways: AlertPay (verified), EcuMoney (verified), LibertyReserve, PerfectMoney, StrictPay (verified), SolidTrustPay (verified). Be careful when you request a withdrawal using STP, because the minimum amount is $1 (STP rules). If your request is lower than $1 the withdrawal will be denied and your money will be sent back to your account balance.

However, payments are not automatic, because using API is very risky. Someone could use a payment processor or script bug and withdraw more than allowed. Payments are made in a maximum of 24 hours (1 calendar day) after withdrawal request has been sent. The only thing you need to do is to login into your account, check account balance and if higher than zero, go to Withdraw.

5. I know that since I reviewed your program that you have added one new plan. Tell us about that. Why did you decide to add it after the site was launched? What are the benefits of joining it? How has it been received by the members? Is it a popular choice?

Yes, after your review many members saw ImperialFinances quality and requested another plan with daily payments. Because we didn’t know what plan could be better, we ran a poll where anyone could vote on it. And the chosen one was “1.5% daily for 30 days + principal back”, a total profit of 145% in only 30 days. Members have chosen it so we’ve added it. Minimum is $5 too and anyone can benefit from this plan.

6. What about the security of the ImperialFinances website? What steps have you taken to protect both yourselves and members from things like malicious hackers or identity theft? What about spyware and anti virus protection? Are you on a dedicated server and how protected are you from DdoS attacks? Tell us also about the script and any other security features.

To answer this question, I’ve sent it to KODDOS. Here is the answer:
“Yes, sir. The server where ImperialFinances is hosted has complete antivirus software, updated every hour. Software includes: antispyware, antivirus, powerful firewall, file antivirus, activity analysis, registry guard, web activity control, intrusion detection system, MySQL server advanced SQL injection protection and many other features. After the last DDOS attack, your site has been moved to a dedicated IP with 1Gbps DDOS protection. Since then it has been attacked, but never been offline, not even for a couple of seconds. Now regarding hackers and identity theft: is impossible to create a 100% secured script or system, but we can guarantee you that no hacker can attack your MySQL databases. And the most important thing: you entire data are under continuous back-up every 12 hours. So you can restore your site anytime and make it to look like 12 hours ago. Don’t worry, everything is 24/7 monitored”.
I think this answer is more than enough.

ImperialFinances is built on a GoldCoders Licensed script (check here) and we have quality and safety guarantee from GoldCoders.

Other security features that we apply: never use payment processor API, all our passwords are generated by software, NO dictionary based password. This is what I advise all members: NEVER USE DICTIONARY BASED PASSWORDS. If you don’t have a password generator software, at least mix letters and numbers in your password, and be careful with phishing sites and spam emails.

7. How have you been promoting the program so far? What advertising strategy are you using? How big a part have the existing members played in this? Are you satisfied with that level of support?

We started to promote ImperialFinances from day one on most of the popular forums. This was one of the best strategies and now we are focused on advertising on the most popular blog (Money-News-Online) and monitors. I am really satisfied with the membership up to now, and is more then I expected after 16 days. ImperialFinances beat all my expectations. Members are very supportive and this makes me happy. ImperialFinances even survived the LR problems, because ImperialFinances is not based only on LR like other HYIPs. We have three verified payment processors and this is why we are still here.

8. I believe you have recently launched a promotional contest to motivate members to get more active in spreading the word about ImperialFinances. Tell us about that. I see the referral commission system in ImperialFinances in general is also quite generous. Can you explain to us how that works?

As I’ve specified in the newsletter, I was thinking of having a unique contest. Most of programs use classic contests, referral contest, higher referral commission, deposit bonus. This is why we launched “CONTEST IN CONTEST”.

First is just a simple trivia: GUESS HOW MANY MEMBERS HAS IMPERIALFINANCES? Simply send your answer to guess@imperialfinances.com: your program nickname and number. Winner gets $10 in account balance.

The seconds contest is preparing the third contest. We need a special idea from someone. Send your ideas to contest@imperialfinances.com . You can send all your ideas, and if we choose yours you get $25 to your account balance.

Honestly, these contests are not to motivate members to get more active. This is to give them a small bonus, something different than other HYIPs, something unique. A HYIP doesn’t need to be boring, just login, deposit, logout. Then login, withdraw, logout.

ImperialFinances has 5 levels of referral commission: 1st level – 5%, 2nd level 3% and 3rd, 4th, 5th – 1%. Total 11% referral commission.

How can we offer such high referral commissions? Simple. Some days you trade more and some day’s a less amount of money. When you trade more and is a good day you can get almost 2.5% return. That’s the best. Diana and Nathan don’t trade only ImperialFinances funds; they manage all our funds (almost 70% of our members’ investments). With more funds, we get more profit for our members. A real trader must have his own trading capital.

9. What about the success of the program overall so far? Are you pleased with the level of growth to date? Can you give us any statistics on the amount of members and the total amount deposited? What are your expectations over the coming months?

ImperialFinances is already a success. In 16 days we have a big membership. Growth is amazing. If every Imperial investor would post all his deposits and withdrawals, ImperialFinances would have many many pages on all forums. I can’t share all stats, but they are already big. I can say that the 3 biggest investments are $2,500, $2,120 and $1,800. That means only two things: TRUST AND SAFETY. I think it is better to have 500 upgraded members than 5,000 free members. In the next months we’re even thinking of going private. I know it’s unusual for an HYIP, but at this moment this is just an idea from Rick. Anyway, if we take this decision, we will announce it to you at least with a month before. We expect membership to grow especially when the first payments from the 30 day plan are made.

10. What kind of customer service and support do you offer to investors? What are the most effective ways of getting in contact with you is I have questions or problems? Do you contribute to any of the main investment forums? Do you have a “live chat” feature?

When ImperialFinances started, we had only email support. After a while we have added “Live Chat” managed by Rick. At the beginning, Rick joined a couple of forums for support but now he is too busy with Live Chat and email support requests. Now we are preparing our own forum. It’ll be ready in a few days.

11. A lot of good HYIPs have opened in the last six to eight weeks. There is a pretty big choice out there for the investor now so if you had just one thing to say to potential members to convince them to give you their money, what would it be?

ImperialFinances is not an ordinary HYIP. I read a few days ago where you published a list of HYIPs that failed after LR problems and I didn’t see ImperialFinances there. If LibertyReserve was our only payment processor, yes we were gone. ImperialFinances is using 6 payment processors, all of them with active investments. It is impossible to collapse after a few days of inactivity of LibertyReserve for us. We are not based on LR. But we can get profit with any e-currency available at this moment. If it was impossible to make profit, we wouldn’t accept investments through that payment processor.

Btw, I can’t convince someone to GIVE me his money. Impossible. But I can convince someone to TRUST me and INVEST with ImperialFinances. Guaranteed returns for YOUR OWN FINANCIAL EMPIRE.

12. Moving slightly off topic, what’s your opinion of the online HYIP industry in general? Perhaps you could share some of your experiences with us, both good and bad? I don’t mean as an admin, but as an observer and an investor yourself.

I knew you would ask this, because I read carefully Money-News interview archive. I was a member and investor in some big HYIPs in 2008. I can mention SafeAtom, where I got a very nice profit before their collapse. Tradelite is the other program that I’ve enjoyed the most. I really liked their script and security. Honestly, the payout ratio for me in Tradelite was around 800% (I mean all payouts / all deposits). In HYIP arena there are many admins that are looking for quick profit with attractive plans, claim they are trading stock, forex, oil, gold etc., and in fact they don’t even know what ForEx means. Most of them think in forex you can get 200% of your deposit per day, but if this was real, the world financial crisis wouldn’t be here.

13. And finally, what are the future plans for ImperialFinances? How do you see the program developing in the near future? What are your realistic ambitions for ImperialFinances?

I have some future plans in my mind, but still thinking about them. The most important thing is that I am looking for a professional PHP or ASP.NET programmer to develop a professional investment platform for ImperialFinances. When the program has more than 1,000 – 1,500 members that platform should be ready. I think maximum 45 days, including tests and all security measures. After that ImperialFinances will be accessible using SSL connection too. For the next few days, I want to just prepare the forum and take care of advertising.

Realistic ambitions? ImperialFinances should become next Tradelite. I think I have every chance of achieving this goal. This is my dream, and I will do everything to make it real.

Finally, thank you for accepting ImperialFinances on your blog. Is a great opportunity and honor for me. I never thought my program will be 7th on your Personal Favorites. You are doing a great job with Money-News-Online. Keep up the good work Paul. Best regards.”

Before I finish I guess I should first of all thank Will for taking the time to provide such detailed answers and add that I appreciate the fact that he did not try and avoid any questions as several admins have done in the past.

As most of you are probably aware by now I am usually skeptical about the claims of HYIP admins to be involved in various investment activities, so really I am doing no disservice to Will and his program by saying the same thing goes for ImperialFinances. You the reader will need to be only one who decides how you take that information anyway so don’t let my personal skepticism sway you too much one way or another. Time will ultimately prove what this program is made of anyway. But right now one thing that is undeniable is the enthusiasm of the admin. And his ambition (ok, so that’s two things, lol!). The ability of the admin is something not to be underrated, especially when he has the support of the members. That combined with some perfectly reasonable plans and a well thought out and executed strategy might just combine to keep ImperialFinances running for several months. Of course I can always be wrong and as we all know anything can (and does) happen in this industry. But for now ImperialFinances seems to be off to the best possible start and that can prove crucial in this business.