How To Stay Away From Internet Marketing Scams
Imagine this: You’ve joined an affiliate program, you’ve bought your own domain, bought some hosting for it, invested a few weeks in developing a professional-looking website, and a few more weeks in promoting it. Sales start to come, your account gets bigger every day… only you never actually see the money, because the affiliate network went bankrupt and cannot pay its members. Or, despite your good level of traffic, the conversions are very, very low, so you start thinking that you are lousy when it comes to copywriting.
The reason of this article comes from my personal experience with one affiliate network which I recommend you not to do any business with: Joebucks.com, recently re-branded as MarketHealth.com.
I’ve joined them some time ago, because I was tired of the very small commissions from Amazon, and when I saw these guys pay 50% of all sales, I thought I’d better invest some time (and money) in promoting their products. They seemed so professional and helpful in the beginning, that I immediately bought a domain and set up my sites on it. JoeBucks offered turnkey websites for the affiliates, so it was enough to upload them on your server in order to have them up and running.
But I thought to avoid duplicate content: I spent a couple of days changing the texts in the websites, optimizing them for search engines, submitting them to directories… I even joined a bunch of forums health-related and I set up an AdWords campaign.
I was about to set the daily budget on $50 and to let the campaign run for several days, when I got a thought which saved my money (too bad I couldn’t turn back time):
What if JoeBucks was a scam?
A quick search in Google revealed an interesting fact: some of the affiliate links on affiliates’ websites were hijacked and redirected to one single ID, which probably belongs to JoeBucks. So, instead of a conversion rate of, let’s say 2%, the affiliate appeared to have only 0.5%. The difference went straight into JoeBucks’ pockets, and instead of getting the promised 50%, the affiliate only got it on paper, while in reality that figure was much lower.
The funniest thing was that I found this info on a post on NiggyBuzz, which was actually praising JoeBucks. After reading the comments on that post, I checked my websites and it was true: the best selling product had the affiliate link hijacked! NiggyBuzz deleted the content of that appreciative post, but he left the comments in place, and you can still read the whole story (and I advise you to read it, in order to make yourself an idea of what can happen if you don’t pay attention which programs you’re partnering with). I discovered that there were more people who noticed the scam and wrote about it in forums, where they even got an answer from JoeBucks that they should delete their cookies (stupid and impertinent).
As you’ll see from those comments, I wrote JoeBucks myself, but I got no answer (and it will soon be one year since then - I suppose they had plenty of time to answer me, don’t you think so?). I stopped my AdWords campaign immediately, so the damage was less that $10. The lesson I learned that day was actually much more valuable than 10 bucks, and I’m sure I would have never found it in any $47 or $97 ebook out there.
Never Trust Something That Seems Too Good To Be True
Every marketplace has its rules, and prices are usually regulated by demand and offer. Why then, would somebody give you a much better deal than his competitors? I’m not saying it isn’t possible, I’m just telling you to try to gather as much info as you can before putting your time and money into that:
- Search the internet marketing forums like WickedFire, DigitalPoint, 5 Star Affiliate Marketing, using the name of the program you wish to join, plus the word “scam”. If you don’t find anything, open a new thread and ask about others’ experience with that program.
- Do the same search in Google Blog Search. Bloggers usually write about scams which they’ve been a victim of.
- Ask people you’re friendly with. Given all this social networking madness today, it is most probable that you already have some friends in a few such networks. Ask them if they know about your discovery, and try to find out if there are people who actually got paid by that program. Money on paper won’t keep you warm until they are transferred into your bank account.
- If you cannot find any information, but you still think you discovered a good program, join it, but be cautious and don’t invest too much in it, neither time nor money, until you receive your first check.
Stay alert, read the blogs about making money online (or better subscribe to their feeds), and the internet marketing forums. You can also set a Google alert for “internet marketing scam” or for “make money online scam” and you’ll get all related news in your feed reader.
And if you discover such a scam, blog about it. Lots of other bloggers will thank you.
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[...] I read some news about people who are victim of fraud. I read about making money online, or about making money for others online, I discover cool making money programs, but I also find out about scams I need to keep myself away [...]
The above views really describe an incident happened with me few days ago. I was cheated by a guy from whom I received a mail saying to deposit some money for a good traffic on internet. I must become aware of the frauds that happen often on internet marketing .
Your tips for researching possible scams are dead on. You absolutely gotta take some time and do some “due diligence” and research stuff before taking the plunge. I hate to say it, but if you don’t, then you get what you deserve! With all the info on the web there is no reason for anyone to make bad decisions about this.
Michael Martine, Blog Consultant’s last blog post..Blogging Ethics 101a - Feed Aggregation and Scraping
Michael, thank you for your input. Unfortunately, when you are new to internet marketing, all things seem so attractive, and that’s why so many people get scammed everyday. They don’t even think to gather at least some basic info, and then they complain to everybody they know that internet = scam.
And there is no shortage of scams!
Michael Martine, Blog Consultant’s last blog post..Blogging Ethics 101a - Feed Aggregation and Scraping
No, the world is full of “smart guys” who are probably proud of what they do.
From your mention of “smart guys” I remember one scam I experienced. It was not internet marketing scam, but was online shopping scan that kept charging my card for some amount everymonth back there in 2004-2005. So I opened a thread in DP, and unfortunately and surprizingly that thread still gets new victims everyday even in 2008 with comments from new users that they were scammed and came to that thread searching for any info on that particular scam.
Life is Colourful’s last blog post..IE Crash While Closing Internet Explorer Due to Skype Add-On
Wow! That was surely a good amount of time! I hope you didn’t have a big loss.
Yes, they not only steal your money they steal the use of domain names that you pay for.
Kathy, I think you should contact your registrar regarding this issue. They may be able to restore your use of the domain.
Simonne’s last blog post..GoDaddy Stops Selling .Info Domains
They registered it under their registrar using their passwords, etc. I cannot access it. I have the codes I need from godaddy to transfer the domain. I just can’t get the needed code from herbalbiz because they are giving me the run around. I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau against them. They tried to make it look like it was all my fault. They have not replied to my rebuttal. I filed a complaint against them yesterday with my Attorney General.
I hope you’ll manage to get your domain back, Kathy. Too bad such people exist!
Thank you. I hope so too. I hate having my name on a domain out there that is promoting people like that.
I see alot of your posts Kathy. Don’t worry KATHY. They’ll be gone soon or they’ll just change their business name again. What goes around comes around. It’s only a matter of time until affiliate marketing is more regulated. My favorite company I made maoney with is. MoreNiche!!! I love them. PERFECT. Great training and they never scam you. I’m doing well with them. Good luck.
I agree Alyssa. Yes, I agree with you MoreNiche is a good one. Although, I’ve found something I like better than them.
Just wanted to let you know what they think is their final reply to the BBB regarding my domain. I quote here what they said: “We placed the consumer domain on unlock. Consumer’s failure to obtain her domain name could be her not having capability to host her own domain name.” I have several domains.
The problem is they do not pay attention. I don’t know how many times I have told them that just unlocking the domain doesn’t do it. My new registrar needs an EPP code which is obtained when you request a domain to be transferred out.
Kathy, try to give them a phone call. It’s incredible that such things can happen.
I have called them. They just give me the run around. They are not even returning my emails.
I’ve been involved in Affiliate Marketing for awhile and if you need to sell health products. My advice is MoreNiche or,Genbucks,.. I’ve never had a problem with them since joining. I think Moreniche is great. The training materials and support are the best I ever saw. Just my opinion. I love the fact that they really seem to care. I live in the usa and was worried because they were far from here but it really doesn’t matter I guess. Please don’t fall for the 50% on paper Markethealth offers. Many of us did. I spoke to a man that actually met Gary and Jason from Markethealth at a trade show while I was in a forum and he told us that they really seemed strange and dishonest. VERY FAKE. He said he was so appalled at how fake they were, that once he got home from the trade show he stopped marketing them. This is how they must be then. Alyssa
I’ll never forget the time when Gary was bullshitting everyone on his forum he had about how they were NOT making money because they never knew what they were doing with the tracking codes “affiliate links” they were using. HEY GARY…. A 6 year old can use your affiliate codes. Anyway…. He ended up getting this guy with alot of software knowledge tell Gary on his board as this was all happening how Gary and his company were re-routing their traffic with their software. He pissed Gary off so bad and scared him that GARY shut down the forum in minutes!!!!!!!!!!Thats when I knew he met his match and closed up shop in his forum because he was finally proven wrong by a software geek. This guy had GARY by the balls and Gary MCwinpy ran off like a bitch.
Thats so funny about Gary. I heard about that happening to him. I also love MoreNiche. The training is good. I feel the products they sell are very expensive. I STILL CAN’T SELL ONLINE EBOOKS THROUGH CLICKBANK THOUGH!!!! LOL… I just can’t do it. I’m sticking to health products.