I’ve always believed in actually reading, viewing and trying the stuff I review, and that’s what I’ve taught my students as well. I don’t care HOW somebody got their review copy – whether they bought it, or they begged for it, or they were offered a copy by the product owner. What I care about is that the reviewer has a first hand knowledge about the product.
But is this point of view good for business? Who’s selling the most copies? Me, with my ethical methods, or those marketers with thousands of people on their list, who promotes ten new products each week, without going much further than to the swipe file?
Sad News for the Honest Marketer?
I’ve been close.
Two years ago, I reviewed and promoted “Easy Paycheck Formula” by Sara Young. I was number 4 or 5 on the leaderboard during the whole time, about to get my reward, when some – to me still today – unknown person took my place.
Except for Cynthia Howard and Bob Yeager, who hadn’t been on the leaderboard prior to that day, I recognize all the other names on that list. Those are big names. How could I compete with them? I’ll tell you in a moment, but first about some of the cases where I couldn’t compete.
Go Go Go BIG Launch
At least once a week, there’s a big launch with thousands of dollars at stake for the affiliates. There are hype going on, swipe files that tells the end-user nothing about the product, or just plain out lie about it, and there’s either no review copy, or you get it a few hours before.
Can the honest marketer compete with the big names on such launches?
I would say no.
I just joined an interesting looking launch. It is supposed to launch Sunday, and this time it wasn’t me who overlooked it, but the product owner who hadn’t announced it before.
Review copies were available, so I asked for one. And got one.
There were supposed to be videos as well as PDF-files, but I could only see the PDF-files. Further down on the page, it said that the videos were avaiable in the paid area.
I asked one of the product owners: Did I get this right? The videos aren’t included in the review copy?
Yes, that’s right, he said. The videos are very big, and there wouldn’t be time to review them.
But he was sure that I could do a nice review from what I got anyway. I politely thanked no.
First of all, I don’t promote what I haven’t seen.
Second, but this is a minor reason, I wouldn’t be able to compete with the marketers who have thousands on their list, and who don’t care whether or not the product is good. They take a look at the sales page and the profit. We were actually promised 100% on the main product and 100% of the OTO, so I bet there will a good deal of people promoting this on Sunday.
It would seem, then, that it pays off big time to be dishonest, and that you can only make a little money by being honest and doing ethical marketing. Right?
There’s Hope for the Ethical Marketer
Tiffany Dow is the living proof that it can pay big time to be honest and ethical. She rips her reviews apart, and she doesn’t go after the go-go-go-big-launch products either. She does the same thing I do: choose the good products, the evergreen ones.
Yeah, sure, some of the big names that promotes just about anything might make more money. At least for now. But in the long run? I hope not. I hope that people will start to recognize those fake “reviews” that use wordings like “my friend GURU X has just released this product, and I’m not sure how long you can get it…” – and which doesn’t speak a word about what’s in it, what results he’s gotten himself etc.
Don’t you think that people will start seeing a pattern?
And when some of those big names promotos 5-6 new products daily – do you think they have time to go through them all? Can you trust those recommendations?
If you want to become a part of the good guys, and promote and review products like Tiff and I do, then you might be interested in a short eBook, Tiffany Dow has published recently. I will make an honest review later, but I do fully endorse it. It’s probably the best book Tiffany ever wrote!
You can get it here: Guide to Cashing in on Shiny New Object Syndrome
My Secret for Holding Up Against the Big Names in the Easy Paycheck Formula Launch
My secret? There’s no secret. The reason why I could do so well is two things:
- The product was great (still is), and I managed to make money with it after a few days of testing it. Haha, I still make money with it, by the way.
- The product owner was clever. I got access to a review copy three weeks before launch. I had plenty of time to go through it all – yes, videos and all, and I could actually create the campains she showed us to create, and I could see results getting in, before the launch. And that’s what I could tell people on my list and people who read my blog.
My advice to you when you pick a product to promote is that you make sure that it’s good and evergreen. You cannot compete the big guys who scroopellessly promote everything. Big a big fish in a small dam, and promote good products that you’ve had the time to review.
Get Tiffany’s book to get you started. Here’s the link again (my affiliate link, in case you haven’t guessed): http://getmoneymakingideas.com/get/SNOS
And then go out there and beat the big guys over the distance. They are sprinters. Become a Marathon runner!