Something is bugging me.
Basically, I just wanted to drop a quick note and apologize for my delay in finishing the Automatic Article Submitter tutorials. I promise I do plan to finish it. I had a couple of really upset readers that were frustrated that I have not been quicker to complete the series, and I wanted to apologize. I have a ton of great excuses that I won't bore you with — except maybe for one.
One of the parts components of the AAS tutorial was to show how we could use Article Marketing to send traffic to a colon cleansing CPA offer. One possible side effect might be conversions of that offer, and I thought that would be a really cool result — bum marketing in action. Whoo hoo. After all, if I could actually show you AAS making money, what better way to for you to get your money back from your investment?
Tutoral Problem: Yucky CPA Offer
So, I picked a “colon cleansing” CPA offer that I thought looked profitable. It paid out when customers ordered a free sample of a colon cleansing product, promising weight loss and all sorts of other benefits. In fact, it paid way too much. I looked into this a little, and realized that I have 2 basic problems with this sort of offer:
- In general they make claims that are way too good to be true. Now, I am not saying that I have evidence that the offer that I was looking at was fraudulent in any way. It just felt too good to be true to me. Magic in a bottle. I general, these offers try to take advantage of peoples emotional weaknesses. I am not crazy about being part of that — even if it pays $25 a lead or whatever.
- In general, these offers rely on the fact that people will accidentally get suckered into the monthly continuity back end. There are lots of shady things going on with these offers. They are generally hard to cancel and sneaky about the signup process. Again, I am not speaking about the offer that I found — I don't know much about it. Just generally speaking, these offers are sleazy.
Obviously, I did not think this through very well.
Go Directly To Jail – Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200
In fact consider what happened recently to an affiliate marketer in Illinois (Thanks to Michelle for bringing this to my attention):
In the third complaint filed today, Madigan sued Amirouche & Norton, LLC and Larby Amirouche, an affiliate marketer that uses Internet search engines, pop-up ads, Web sites, and advertising on social networking sites to drive Internet traffic to suppliers’ Web sites. Madigan’s complaint alleges that the marketer misleads consumers through false advertising and false endorsements. Affiliate marketers like Amirouche & Norton are generally paid by sellers for driving traffic to their sites. The affiliate marketers receive compensation when Internet users click-through to the sellers’ sites and commission for sales resulting from traffic that they route to the sellers’ site.
“We must hold these Internet scammers accountable for their role in a seedy marketing game that steers unsuspecting consumers to online schemes,” Madigan said. “We also need to send a clear message to other marketers and networks in the business of designing misleading, traffic enticing schemes.”
Madigan’s three suits ask the court to enter a permanent injunction barring the defendants from selling dietary supplements or continuing with misleading marketing schemes that impact Illinois consumers. The lawsuits also ask the court to order the defendants to pay restitution for consumers who have lost money and civil penalties of $50,000 for violating the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act.
Scary, huh?
My Standard For Internet Marketing
I actually have a plan for my internet business documented. In the plan, I specifically mention that I want to stay clear of stuff like this. Here is an excerpt from my plan where I mention that my business “should not include things that I am embarrassed to talk about with my mother or my pastor“.
Goal: Build a robust internet business
* The Internet Business will
o have integrity and service to others as its core principles.
o leverage my strengths, including content creation and people skills
o clear at least xxxxxx month.
o require no more than 10 hours per week to run (2 hours per day in the morning)
o leverage outsourcing and automation.
o be diversified to include affiliate marketing, contextual advertising, automated membership sites and information products.
* The Internet Business will not
o be extensively based on things that do not scale or outsource well (consulting, face to face sales, etc.)
o include things that I am embarrassed to talk about with my mother or my pastor.
o include many things that I do not enjoy
The Bottom Line:
The bottom line is that I don't want that sort of offer to be part of my core business. That is not what I am about. So, I need to retool the tutorial to change that. It will make me feel better.
So there you go — one excuse of many. I will re-tool the experiment and continue with part four of the Automatic Article Submitter case study as soon as possible. Thanks for your patience. And oh yeah — next podcast with Andrew Hansen interview is coming soon as well.
Remember what Setphen W. Vannoy, best-selling author and founder of Pathways to Leadership Inc. has to say:
“Integrity is how you act when no one is watching,
when no one knows what you're doing.”
Hi Mason,
Sounds like you have a pretty clear cut plan to grow your business.
I am still struggling to adequately define my business model and plan a long-term strategy. Like you I am trying to create something that is not built on just trying to make the next buck. Rather I want a sustainable, long-term business that will give a steady stream of income, while providing my readers/customers/ followers with a high level of integrity.
Enjoying following what you have to say.
Omar
In response to Kent F
“Ok, here’s my other issue. How about a high quality product in an industry that has some scamminess to it – like online dating, payday loans, mortgage refinancing? Where do you draw the line. Is a Making Up info. product a scam because it preys on emotional people trying to get their spouse back and are willing to pay $100 to do it?
I just get concerned if we start labeling everything a scam.”
A “product” is only a scam if it doesn’t deliver the promised quality and value. All marketing relies on people’s emotions to some extent; again, it’s only predatory if the purchase fails to deliver enough quality and value to justify the price.
When whole industries become suspect, marketers of high-quality products within those categories are then faced with 2 huge challenges:
1. Proving their product’s integrity.
2. Overcoming “guilt by association” with a questionable industry.
My personal preference is to stay away from questionable industries in order to keep my own reputation healthy.
Thanks for the timely and appropriate post. I just have been bombarded with some guru’s affiliate stomp promotion and saw some of these questionable products are on the list of things to promote. Luckily the cheesy graphics and the promise “no one would be turned down” that they used chased me off.
You know, seeing these types of scams enables me to help my wife and I steer clear of them. If it’s too good to be true, then it likely is. We’ve been bitten by one of them actually. Thankfully, we got to it and ended it in time, but still trying to get the refund we’re owed.
I’ve also dipped into the acai pool, but only until Squidoo decided to ban such topics. I was frustrated over that, but clearly, if everybody and their dog is into it, then maybe that’s a warning sign in itself.
The Madigan case is interesting Mark, I hadn’t come across it , so thanks.
I guess as an affiliate I ought to be scared or something but I welcome the advance of legal process into Internet Marketing.
Some of the crap I get every day in my inbox seems every bit as bad and I would welcome it if the dolts that send it were busted.
You know what – one of my trainings is in Nutrition and I have not looked into Acai berries but all the hoo haa (on both sides) makes it hard to promote the product.It is probably good – just about all berries are.
Your Colon Cleansing product is probably OK too.
It all depends how it’s done – we’ve all seen what I refer to as “fake” reviews of products but I will continue writing real reviews and I guess you will too.
Maybe the take home on this is to presell stuff you know about and um, treat your readers (as you do) like adults.
Integrity is a biggie – ask affiliates how they choose what to promote and they’ll often cite the % commission and not the quality of the product.
I’ll stop now I’m beginning to ramble!
🙂
If you use Adsense, it might be wise to *regularly* use the Ad Review Center to analyze and filter categories. Unfortunately, the categories are still rather broad (Drugs AND Supplements), and the categories don’t cover *everything*. But, it might help to keep a publisher out of trouble.
I’ve been taking high quality supplements for over a decade, and this is precisely why I avoid marketing unknown supplements through cpa or other offers.
I do have several problems with the article, however. Is the undocumented colon cleanse product that is manufactured in a state of the art facility and sold through direct sales by a respected company like ____ (Shaklee, Nutrilite, etc.) and sells for $40 bottle as much of a scam as the shady company with unknown origins which sells the same “colon cleansing” prodcut for $40, but was manufactured in a dingy warehouse in the middle of nowhere for $1? Remember there is minimal FDA oversight of supplements.
That’s why I say avoid them. But, I do cringe when people look at ALL supplements and direct sales companies as scams.
Ok, here’s my other issue. How about a high quality product in an industry that has some scamminess to it – like online dating, payday loans, mortgage refinancing? Where do you draw the line. Is a Making Up info. product a scam because it preys on emotional people trying to get their spouse back and are willing to pay $100 to do it?
I just get concerned if we start labeling everything a scam.
I think the efficacy of the product is less an issue than the financial fraud aspect–calling something a free trial and then billing their credit card without notice, and not shipping product:
“companies lure customers with free trial offers – through aggressive Internet marketing techniques – and then charge customers’ credit cards prematurely, do not always supply the product and make it nearly impossible to cancel.”
I think that if you don’t abuse people’s cards and actually deliver product, then you should be fine.
Oh, and don’t f*** with Oprah:
“The Attorney General’s office and representatives from Chicago-based Harpo, Inc., coordinated an investigation of consumer complaints – many provided to the Attorney General’s office by Harpo – revealing the deceptive practices of these companies. Neither Ms. Winfrey nor Dr. Oz has ever sponsored or endorsed any acai berry or dietary supplement product.”
Hi Mark,
Thanks for calling attention to this vitally important issue.
As government regulation and “the will of the people” catch up to the explosive growth of the Internet and those who have unscrupulously taken advantage of it, we will be seeing even more stories and court cases like this. Nevertheless, it’s still far too easy to get caught up in the “easy money” frenzy, and in the process, forget things like The Golden Rule and integrity.
One thing that I’m about 99% convinced is the right way to go is to only promote stuff that I personally use and find to be useful. I don’t like the copy and paste emails, carbon copy web sites, and all that, so I tend to listen to people who don’t do it when they do recommend something based on their own experience. I’ll be leaving a lot of money on the table — but there’s still more than enough to be made this way.
Best regards,
Tom
P.S. — Only recommending stuff that we’ve personally reviewed can also help separate the legitimate supplements and etc. from the scam products. If it worked for you, then you can just tell your story and recommend the product; otherwise, leave it alone. Just an idea…!
Mason- That is a very respectable position to take and I tip my hat to you.
Well done mate.
It is about time that the internet marketing field gets a thorough “colon cleanse”. People have been getting ripped off for years and it is only getting worse as more am
nd more quick buck artists try their hand at making money online the way infomercial sleazeballs have been doing it for years.
I say clean up the mess and the good marketers will win.
The main sticking point I’ve run into is if indeed a product and the company selling it is legit. If they treat their customer fairly, not trapping them into a never ending billing cycle. By reviewing the above comments I’m not the only one, which is good to see. Does any one know of a filter to seperate the good from the bad.
No problem Mark, I have plenty to do so I can wait for the next part and I would rather it was ethical…. and that you didn’t get sued 🙂
This is very informative, helpful and easy to digest. Keep this coming. Thanks!! http://www.sabetsu.com
Good post Mark. Sometimes we all need to stop and think about what we are doing and why. There is a reason why sites like Squidoo are frowning on weight loss, health type sites. It’s hard for people to separate the good from the bad. There are so many things out there that we can truthfully promote and stand behind.
You have Newbie Marketers looking to you to teach them ethical methods of Affiliate Marketing. This is definitely something they should consider.
I purchased AAS a couple of months ago but haven’t used it — yet! Your series on the software has regenerated my enthusiasm for it, so thanks. It is a heck of a product.
I’m looking forward to your videos though. Milan (the creator) is a heck of a nice guy but I am having problems with his instructions.
Mark, I know you want to show real world proof that using AAS will assist in our marketing efforts, but honestly, I just want to see how to use it and get the most out of the darn thing!
My vote is to finish up the series with a topic you’re comfortable with. Everyone’s mileage will vary anyway so why not just cover what this puppy can do. Fire it up!
Thanks
Mark
(a fellow Texan and sharer of a noble name.)