KD or the Retail Trader? (Part 2)

Is the takeaway from this blog mini-series more a reflection of KD or of retail traders in general?

I left off discussing my outreach to 12 people from the Y collaboration worksheet. Here are the results:

• One said he had moved on from KD’s approach and was now trying something else.
• One said he had not yet started to apply KD’s approach and would not be any help (despite the fact that he added himself to the spreadsheet months earlier).
• One said he hadn’t gotten anywhere with KD’s approach because he was struggling with the programming.
• Two responded enthusiastically about working together but did not respond to a subsequent e-mail.
• Seven did not respond at all.

I am shocked by the overall response. I stated in the third paragraph here that I could not recommend KD because I had yet to find any success. This is supported by the total reception to my e-mails. Most people having success would be happy to share stories, meet others who are like-minded, hear other potentially helpful suggestions, etc. Over half my e-mails went without any response, two gave no substantive response, and the rest expressed failure and/or remarkably weak excuses.

I cannot exclude the spam filter as reason for why so many e-mails went unacknowledged. Two of the nine were second e-mails following an initial response, which makes the spam filter doubtful. I don’t know about the other seven. Keep in mind, though, that all messages went to people who voluntarily put themselves on a list to be contacted. I am somewhat computer literate and know to check my spam folder periodically for non-spam messages. I would like to think that intelligent people spending thousands of dollars for strategy development education would also know, but I can’t be sure.

Six months later, a newbie contacted me. He wrote:

     > Hello,
     >
     > How are you? I just took KD’s Y workshop and saw that you are
     > open to collaboration.
     >
     > I’ve been recently liberated from a high-tech job as a product
     > manager/business development in Silicon Valley. I’m trying to build
     > a steady income stream by trading futures. I’ve submitted one
     > strategy to the club so far and I’m trying to build up a diversified
     > portfolio.
     >
     > Let me know if you are open to corresponding through email.
     >
     > Thanks,
     >
     > DO

I think the message I sent to others was a proper introduction and done with enough awareness to avoid alarm. DO’s message to me most assuredly accomplished the same. NS’s initial contact that I included in the last post: not so much.

Speaking of NS, I will get back to his surprising ending next time.