Dan Brown AcademyReviews of danbrownacademy.com

If I could give them a 0 I would. I signed a contract in October 2024 for their Platinum Package book promotion and services at a pre-paid cost of $8,004.00. Here are the failure points which they have never addressed and I have written them numerous times. I am posting this and requesting a full refund for breach of contract and failure to perform. Section 1 Scope of Services 1.1 E-Commerce Website Development. The website was set up. Once the book was launched there were 5 orders placed and NOT a single book was shipped. I had to ship them from my own supply at no charge. 1.2 Search Engine Marketing. I have seen no evidence of this. In this provision they claimed they would put my book on Google and Bing. The book is NOT available on either service. 1.3 Search Engine Optimization. They produced no documentation to satisfy that this occurred. 1.4 Amazon Optimization and 1.5 Author Central Page Set-up. These were done, however, it required me hiring a second resource to fix the keywords, make grammatical corrections and more. 1.6 Video Trailer Production. This was done and in fact done quite well 1.7 Google Knowledge Panel. A draft was presented and approved, but it was never placed on Google, or at least I can't find it. 1.8 Paid Advertisements. The contract called for placements on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and Amazon. There was absolutely ZERO advertising done by Dan Brown Academy. 1.9 Blog posts. Blog posts were produced. 1.10 Official press release distributed to relative media outlets. There is no evidence that this was ever done, nor did I receive a media printout of validation of where ads were run which is standard in the industry to provide. 1.11 Podcast Production. There has never been a podcast production produced or even scheduled after 18 months under contract. 1.12 Distribution of the book would be done on 65 major publishing platforms. Those named in the contract are: Amazon, Apple Books, Google Books and Others. The actual sites they put the book on were Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, LuLu and Ingram Sparks. This is far less than the 65 committed to in the contract. 1.13 Query letter writing. Completed. 1.14 Website Maintenance. Completed 1.15 Time Square Billboard. Never done or proven to have been done. 1.16 Email Marketing. No evidence of this being performed. Section 2 Additional Benefits. 2.1 Lifetime Printing and Shipping. I may be getting that but the site they built is inefficient and they are not advertising so no one is going there. 2.2 this is the big one, they committed to 40,000 book sales. If they sold 40,000 books at $12.99, I would have generated more than $100K in royalties. Dan Brown Academy has not delivered on more than at best 1-2 sales. This review is factual and honest. I've written to Dan Brown Academy via their Project Portal multiple times and while those notes get distributed to a wide audience it goes on deaf ears. I'm requisition a FULL refund or payment for the sale of 10,000 books which was promised in the contract.

Web site portal went dark--no response from anyone. This company is either bankrupt or a total scam. I am on my second book--nearly complete but they seem unavailable to complete the job.

Their publishing team was a delight to work with. My book was not just published; it was strategically placed for success. After the debut, they took care of pricing, classifications, and even offered marketing guidance. I recommend working with them.

The support team at Dan Brown Academy is really helpful. They assisted me with multiple books, and their support was extraordinary.

I liked how the tone at Dan Brown Academy never made me feel like I was being talked down to. They didn't treat me like a novice who had to start from scratch; they treated me like a writer who had potential. I got answers to my questions, useful feedback, and results. My story is now much tighter, more interesting, and ready for the next steps.

Jared from the team is really understanding, I must say, and the entire editing and marketing team did wonders for my first book. They understood how deeply I am connected to my book and delivered the best thing.

Between February and August 2025, I paid over $31,000 to a publishing company calling itself "Dan Brown Academy." Dan Brown Academy is a not a registered CA entity, although claims to have a LA address. In my opinion, this organization used deceptive sales tactics, false promises, and vague contracts to extract money from me under the illusion of professional publishing and marketing services. They frequently invoked famous author Dan Brown's name and displayed his image on their webpage to appear legitimate. This was done to get me to believe they were owned by Dan Brown so that I would sign the initial contract. Sadly, I was fooled and signed. Their contracts were generic, their work unusable, and every "milestone" was just another upsell. Calls and emails came from people using fake names and mismatched email addresses, constantly pushing new "mandatory" services to reach the "next level." Once I paid Dan Brown, their operation turned into a high-pressure hustle. My "advisor" praised my work, gassed me up with the idea of turning my book into multi-language translations, audio book, ebook, and (I am not kidding) an iphone game based on my book, all for fees of course. They tried to sell various website packages (one for the book and for me the author). Oh, and social media marketing- all extra. They also said that they would, for a fee, write a movie script and pitch it to to Netflix, Amazon, and Paramount--if I would just pay one more fee. Stupid me should have stopped right there and run away, but I got caught up in the hype. Mind you all these high-pressure sales are before the book is even written. Eventually, I did come to my senses and when I questioned results, they stalled, and claimed management was "reviewing the book." In my view, their goal was never to deliver services but to keep clients paying until they ran out of money or patience. I challenged charges on my credit card and got back alot of my monies but not all. I threatened to sue and still may sue because they still have not issued all my refund back. I was eventually able to get almost all of my money back after threatening legal action but the refunds were not issued by Dan Brown Academy, but instead were issued by another company--raising further red flags. I have filed complaints with the California, Massachusetts, and Texas Attorneys General, and the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center. I strongly warn authors to avoid this company--it operates as a sales hustle, not a publisher..

From start to finish this company screwed me over. The project manager failed to read my messages I sent him, failed to follow my instructions, and for the entire day of yesterday, March 31, failed to give me a status update on my book project.