Learning from a good mentor or trading coach is one of the best investments you can make for your long term success.  You invest in yourself with workout trainers or lessons from golf pros.  Why not invest in your financial future with skills to make money in the stock market for years to come?  Most people never get to live off of investing or trading because they never learn the skills and rules of the game to play it well.  A common mistake is thinking you can figure out the rules and develop the strategies yourself, but lose not just time but most or all of your savings trying to reinvent the wheel.  Why set yourself up for failure?  Trading mentoring programs there to help transfer knowledge from the experienced traders those who are just beginning. You get to see the way they interpret market movement and how they play the game. You’ll also understand the strategic trade-offs that they consider before making an investment decision.

Mentoring programs are broken up into two main groups: One-on-One and Group/Classroom. One-on-one private lessons will obviously cost more, but (with a good coach) can be tailored to your specific skills, problems, and goals.  On the other hand, a classroom atmosphere allows for collaboration and discussion that can stimulate the mind and lead to other types of trading techniques that might have otherwise gone untouched.

The most important thing to think about when choosing a trading coach is whether the coach can teach you something you’re comfortable with, not just what they want to teach.  Bad mentors are usually one-trick ponies who only know one or two things and trying to make money off of unsuspecting amateur students.  We have enough trading veterans who also coach, so you shouldn’t even have to settle for mediocre “experts” as coaches.  It’s like choosing to learn from a NBA superstar or a high school basketball coach.  The choice is obvious.

The Basics

1. Experience. The biggest key for the mentor or teacher is to gauge the experience level of the student(s). Therefore, be brutally honest with your mentor about how much experience you have and what you’d like to get out of this class. In the one-on-one classes, it’s important to understand that your mentor can better cater the class to your skill level as well as your goals, so don’t be shy about expressing what you’d like to know.
2. Trading Techniques. For beginners, mentors can be extremely helpful in determining what type of techniques, strategies, etc will fit what you are looking for. For example, Trade Pilot Pro program provides a ton of technical indicators and experience that accommodate day trader, swing traders and long-term investors. This is one of the premier trading programs for the specific reason that they provide tools for all traders, and provide great expertise and advice.  Advanced traders, even money managers trading several million dollars, often have trading coaches to help them through slumps or help review what’s going well. Advanced traders are still human that can be affected by emotions and decisions.  Even top tennis pros need coaches, so don’t be embarrassed to get help (and end up losing money).
3. Risk Appetite. We want the biggest bang for our buck. In that sense, mentoring programs can be that bang. Instead of drowning for months and months trying to figure the game out all by yourself, learn the game first from someone who can already play the game well. Many people feel like programs that cost $100s or $1000′s to be part of a mentoring program is expensive, but everyone who’s invested in the stock market has lost thousands or tens of thousands in stocks, mutual funds, or something else.  It’s about opportunity cost…the amount you’ll lose if you have no idea what you’re doing. Any trader can get lucky, but these professionals make a consistent, lucrative living off of their investments. They must be doing something right! So if they want to teach you, I’d be eager to learn.
4. Asset Class.  Mentoring programs are usually specific to a particular asset class. The coach’s experience and success is in that specific field.  Some mentoring programs teach methods you can use across different asset classes (i.e. technical indicator programs across Futures & Equity).  However, it’s important to understand that while the techniques might be similar, the strategies are usually different. Just remember that mentoring programs are usually specific to asset class, so visit MarketHeist’s products pages and reviews for more information.

The Choices

One-on-One (usually through online virtual environments)

• Type: Trading programs (curriculum), trading techniques, apprenticeship
• Pros: Extremely high education value, transfer of knowledge, hands-on programs, builds close relationships for future endeavors, adjustable curriculum
• Cons: Information bias based on mentor’s experiences, buyer beware for fraud
• Summary: Great for transfer of knowledge and building close relationships with mentor but remember to take everything with a grain of salt and understand the applicability of the technique or strategy rather than taking it at face value

Classroom (usually through online virtual environments)

• Type: Educational/Coaching Chatrooms, Trading programs, trading techniques, apprenticeship
• Pros: Great transfer of knowledge, collaboration & discussion with peers, hands-on program
• Cons: Rigid curriculum, information bias based on mentor’s experience, Not as close a relationship built with mentor
• Summary: Great for knowledge transfer and collaboration of ideas, but you sacrifice that with a less close relationship with your mentor — of course, everything is what you make of it…

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