Okay, so I’ve never had a “beef of the month” before, at least not in this newsletter. But I’m fed up, sick and tired of some of the B.S. that I and my fellow marketers are subjected to day after day after day.
Let me give you just two examples I encountered in the last two hours:
First, I received an email proclaiming that I was going to make money in the next 60 minutes, guaranteed.
And you know what? It’s entirely possible to do that. Go post in forums that allow you to use an affiliate link in your sig file and you could make a commission in the next hour. And of course there are other ways, too.
So I thought, “Why not?” and I opened the email and clicked the link.
And what do I find? First, a video telling how awful it is that Internet Marketers are bombarded with “Click this and make money!” kind of nonsense. He’s ranting on about piling one falsehood on top of another to make a buck off of you.
Meanwhile there’s this red banner ticking the time down like some bomb is going to go off if you don’t whip out your wallet and send him your money immediately.
Okay, so far, so tolerated, but just barely. We’re all familiar with the, “Everyone else is trying to stick it to you but I’m the good guy you can trust” routine. It’s old, it’s tired, and I suppose it still works. I’m not even faulting the guy for that, or his ticking time bomb banner.
But then you scroll a little further and what do you see? A headline very similar to the one below (I’m not using the actual headline but this is close.)
New Software “Artificial Intelligence”
Rigs A Certain Website In Your
Favor, Producing
OVER HALF A MILLION DOLLARS
in just 39 Hours
Your Only 2 Options:
- Be a part of it…
- Or Eat Our Dust
The real headline had red numbers over an inch tall in place of “Over Half a Million Dollars.”
There’s a good chance you’ve seen a headline like this recently, along with a dozen more that could have been clones.
So here’s what we’ve got: A guy going on and on about how terrible these ridiculous promises are, while he’s making a ridiculous promise.
Who really, truly, honestly believes that…
a) There is a software that tampers with a certain MAJOR website and produces HALF A MILLION DOLLARS for you in 39 hours?
b) If this major website caught someone “rigging” them, they wouldn’t fix the hole and bring a lawsuit faster than you can say “Uh-oh?”
c) If there were such a software, it would be sold out in the open for a lousy 49 bucks?
This is where I normally close the page, and I imagine a LOT of other people close the page because who believes this crap?
But if you let the video play out, or continue reading the sales pages, eventually you come to the point: They’re just poking fun. Really they were hired by a big company whose name they cannot reveal to create a revolutionary software that blah blah blah.
So in other words, while you’re not supposed to believe everyone else’s nonsense, you are supposed to believe theirs.
But hey, let’s give them the benefit of the doubt and go to the Warrior Forum to see what others have to say about their product…
…so I go and check and guess what I find?
Bad BAD reviews from those who either a) purchased and tried to use this product or b) purchased a previous product from the same seller that didn’t come CLOSE to living up to the sales letter.
So what’s my point? Folks, in this business your reputation is EVERYTHING. If you don’t want to get shut down by Paypal or your merchant account, if you want to be in business a year from now (or even a month from now) you’ve got to cut the crap and simply tell it like it is.
Yes, you still sell. But you use the TRUTH to sell. And if you have a great product that people want and a great offer, then you really don’t need to do that much selling anyway.
Every time you’re about to do anything in your business, ask yourself: What will this do to my reputation? Enhance it or hurt it? If it can hurt your reputation in ANY way, then just say NO.
One more example: The other day a marketer (who shall remain nameless) launched a new 20 page triple spaced PDF on how to make quick money online. So far so good, right? (Actually, the report was 29 pages, but the other 9 pages were pleas for testimonials and a sales letter for an upsell. And the sales letter was at the beginning of the report AND at the end of the report.)
This marketer has put out other products and received pretty good feedback. In fact, he’s built something of a reputation for himself, so much so that the moment this special offer launched people on his list were buying it without even reading the sales letter.
But guess what? This offer was a flop – and in fact one of the techniques he recommended would get you BANNED from the forum he suggested if you tried to use it. (He’s since removed that technique.)
The other techniques were about as basic as telling you that if you want to live, you should breathe. I mean it’s stuff that anyone who’s been in Internet Marketing longer than 5 minutes already knows. And one of the techniques isn’t even useful anymore since Google’s latest updates. But hey, who cares, he’s making his money, right?
So what happened? During the first few minutes of his launch one person after another wrote things like, “Whatever this guy puts out is gold – get this!”
Then those who purchased read the report. It only takes about 10 minutes to read because it’s a few pages of big font with widely spaced lines.
So next you see comments like, “I’m really disappointed,” and “Why don’t you give refunds?” and so forth.
He started taking one hit after another, and now his reputation with those buyers is shot.
Think about that – he worked for months to build his reputation, only to have it torn to shreds in one day.
Think before you act. The world really is watching you.
