The Right Coach/Mentor?

[angelaktariel]

So, I am wondering, how does one find a coach? How do you even look for one? Do you look for one that you can see face to face, or someone you just talk to on the phone, or just in a chat room? I don't know where to start.

I am at the point, where I want to find someone who can help me set up my day trading system. I am trying to keep it simple as Brownsfan says, but I need to be able to speak to someone about the day to day things one does, when they do trading full time.

I am about to get the right capital to have a good chunk to trade with and for now I am looking to trade stocks strictly. I would be interested in futures and options, but I don't want to get an overload and want to learn those as I have perfected one thing at a time.

So, I am asking you guys, those who really jumped into this, as I am planning on, how do you find a coach, mentor, or whatever you may call that person who is going to help you day to day in the beginning.

I would appreciate the help. The education is tremendeous here, so I know I am asking the right people. If anyone would like to call me, if they have time for a chat, even a quick one, if they can help, please send me a PM and I will send you my cellphone number, as I wasn't sure if I should just advertise it for the world literally to see...hehehe.

Thanks,
Eva

[torero]

Hi Eva,

You can check LBR.com and tradethemarkets.com. I think they do face to face mentoring if this is what you prefer, but I don't think you can do that for a long time (1 week course) without putting alot of money. This is the reason why phone or chat room mentoring is a cost-effective way of doing it.

I think you can go any chat room and just familiarize yourself to the traders and their styles of trading and try to see if they can mentor you. I think this is better than those paid chat rooms where are 40 traders all being mentored by 1 or 2 persons. You can go to TL chat room and hang out and see if anyone is willing to help you out. It just a matter of getting the right match that is important. Good luck.

[brownsfan019]

Eva,
The coach/mentor thing is a tricky one. You'll want to screen any services that you pay for very hard. In particular, you'll want:

• Someone that trades similar to you. No point of having a scalper mentor you if you plan to trade 1-3 times a day.
• Similar/same markets.
• References that you can contact would be great.
• Local or in the area, would be even better.
• Need everything in writing when paying.

The value of a coach/mentor cannot be underestimated. The problem in trading is that there are many 'coaches' out there more than willing to snatch up your dollars. You really have to do some research to make sure it's a good fit.

As a side note, I've thought about doing something along these lines down the road. The problem is that I think my fees would not be manageable for a new trader. That's the catch 22 here - any good coach, is probably going to be real expensive. And when new to trading, that can be a large capital expenditure.

I would start with checking the ads and articles in trading magazines. One that I see a lot BUT CANNOT SPEAK TO THE VALUE is http://www.tradingontarget.com/

Here's a thread I started on the same topic: http://www.traderslaboratory.com/for...rent-2084.html

Keep us posted on your search. If you came back to this thread and provided reviews, that would help many traders out.

[brownsfan019]

Eva,
You can also sometimes find decent pay for seminars at http://www.tradersexpo.com

I believe Adrienne and others have spoken there in the past, so that could be a way to see some of these coaches live before plunking down any serious cash. Again, have to do your homework first.

[monad]

According to some folks on teh VSA thread, Joel Pozen is an excellent coach especially in the field of Price/Volume relationship and market manipulation by smart money. It might be worth contacting some of these guys via PM to get more details.

[fred333]

That sounds like a great idea.

[zdo]

90% of trading coaches are sincere and well intended - but 80% of trading coaches are incompetent. They attribute their own deficits to you and try to fix them. They ‘re actually learning to trade by teaching. They learn to fix themselves by learning (usually unsuccessfully) how to fix you – and as soon as they get it they no longer coach. Hm… so, basically, few trading coaches are actually strengths based…

I suggest you go for mentor instead of a coach. Unless you can precisely state your trading style and predilections, expect to go through a series of potential mentors before hopefully finding a fit. If you aren’t yet sure of your trading style(s), I would suggest you spend equal time in self exploration to your ‘screen time’ until you ‘know thyself’ - then apply the ‘speed dating’ technique to find a mentor.

If you want to post (or PM) your trading style – I will put together a few referrals for you.

All the best

[torero]

Very nice suggestion zdo! How true it is. I agree with the mentor part, I think it's the experience that needs to be relayed and learned rather than the technique of trading. I think the last part to success is more mental than market competence.

[AbeSmith]

Angela,

You might be interested in signing up for the free videos at tradethemarkets.com. They also have free webinars from time to time. Also you can sign up for their trading room, last I checked they had a free 14 day trial. There is also tradingeveryday.com. They have a free trial for their trading room as well. Last I checked their trading room had few visitors, and I found that I was getting more personal attention there than at the tradethemarkets.com trading room. Tradingeveryday.com had lots of emphasis on stock trading as well. I don't remember tradethemarkts.com doing any stock trading. Mostly they seem to do futures. But they are traders still so you migh find their videos helpful. And ofcourse there is Trader's Laboratory which is my favorite hangout. The people here are friendly and the site is well managed. When I first got interested in trading I read all the posts in the beginner's forum. Found it to be very helpful.

[angelaktariel]

First of all, thanks all of you for your answers, I knew I would get great information here.



Torero - funny you mention Tradethemarkets.com, as that is one of the sites I have been looking at, and do receive their free (so far) video e-mails and I like their style. I know they have the one on one, group face to face training and online as well, so that is a company on my list to check into as well. I am checking into LBR, as that is one I haven't heard of. I agree with you about the chatrooms. I did check in one day here and people who were there were very helpful, so I will pop in there more often. Also love the site in your signature line. Is that yours? Great stuff for sure.

Brownsfan - thanks for the pointers and I also read your thread of how to find the right coach and that is certainly helpful. Adrienne is going to be my psychology mentor, I already spoke with her and she gave me sort of an outline of what I should do. We talked about a certain school perhaps to attend, or find a mentor. After thinking more about what that school can offer me, I decided as I am getting my capital together quicker than anticipated and I have basic knowledge I have learned already, I would benefit more from a mentor than a school that would cost $5K just to get to a mentor that would cost me another $7.5K. I hope I don't sound too confusing here..hehehe. I also signed up for the tradersexpo and I am in the LA area, the next one here will be in June, but I already have my car gased up and ready to go...hehe. I will keep this thread update on what I find, so other people can learn as well.

Monad - thanks for Joel's name, I will check him out as well.

Zdo- You are too funny...hehehe....special ly the speed dating part. Thanks for inserting some humor.... I am not sure what you mean by trading style, and by saying that, perhaps that means as you said I need to explore myself. All I know is that so far I am interested in plain old stock trading, specifically trading tech stocks, but exploring other sectors as well. So far I have been mainly swing trading, but have been glued to my stock's charts all day watching them to learn how they move, and what seems to make them move. Again, I am pretty much a beginner, but incredibly motivated to do my best, with the information I can find (which so far have been books and CD's). Pretty much willing to do whatever it takes, by that I mean that I will do what my mentor says or recommends. I guess when I said coach and mentor, in my english (which is not my first language, so forgive me for that) was meant the same, so thanks for clarifying as far as who I should be looking for. I am sure there are a lot of people who are good at what they do, but I have to make sure I will be mentored by the right person, with the right style and type of trading as you and Brownsfan both pointed out. I live in southern california and I will also need to switch to a new broker as currently I am with Ameritrade and they are not exactly the best for daytrading. I am also looking for advice on the right software and such, again, I am a beginner.

Thanks everyone so far for your input, it is helping me, and stirring up more questions in my head to answer or find answers for.

I welcome more inputs.

Thanks,
Eva