“THE FTC RULING, if you haven’t heard, levies a $13,000
fine on you if you don’t adhere to their rules… and it starts
on December 1st… just hours away.”

Hurry you wouldn’t want to be out of compliance.

All I want is some common sense explanation of the rules. Thanks to you, Harlan and Andrew I got it.

Thanks a lot for clarifying all of these details about the new FTC regulations.
I don’t think I’ve seen such a detailed report on this anywhere else.

Oh, and I was completely shocked to learn that there are people who actually LIE. And in MARKETING, of all places!!
I think I have to go lie down. 😉

Cheers,
Shane

But that is not the main reason. I’ve read that if you host your site on non US server, and if you have business registered outside of US, you don’t have to obey by these rules.

So the rest of the world has privileges, while we have to obey the rules!

I personally dislike government further sticking their noses into people’s business. It could completely (and with great confusion) turn how I would use testimonials upside down. Can they still be used at all? What format? How much will it all cost to get all the necessary information on how to do it within the guidelines? Who’s to say some schmuck won’t report me (or anyone) because they didn’t bother to lift a finger and therefore never got any results? Extra headaches dealing with BS and less time to doing what needs to be done. This sounds like a huge ball of yarn that is only going to become more and more tangled.

Examples as shown in Harlan’s video are truly shameful, and the sooner things like this are exposed and punished the better.

Hopefully these moves by the FTC will leave the internet a better place for us all to prosper. But I won’t be holding my breath!

Actually, I didn’t mean “you” personally, but rather “you” generally. I apologize for not making that clear.

As to the “how” of compliance … it’s actually very simple. For clues, grab any well-known magazine or newspaper. All that’s really going on, here, is regulations that have been in effect in the print world for decades are now being applied to content on the internet, as well as to content in magazines and newspapers, and on radio and TV.

The type of advertisement known as a “display” ad is something we all recognize as an ad. But the type of advertisement known as a “reader ad” now has to be clearly identified as an advertisement or “advertorial” because, when somebody first thought it up as a way of getting around the FTC regulations, people were misled into thinking it was an opinion piece or editorial, and they wound up spending their money based on that misrepresentation. This, in turn, led to complaints filed with the magazines and newspapers and radio stations and TV stations and states’ attorneys general and, yes, even unto the FTC itself.

Here is all you need to know in order to comply with the new regulations:

All powers that be hate complaints!

In fact, they hate complaints so much that a way will very likely be found to nail your hide to a barn door whether you are “guilty” of wrongdoing or not!

Remember, you’re in Regulatory Territory, now, where the principles of Admiralty Law prevail: “Shoot first and ask questions later!”

The whole “guilty-until-proven-innocent” thing is out the window.

And the name of the game is: “Avoid Complaints Like The Plague!”

If somebody asks for their money back, give it to them. With a smile!

If somebody says, “I would never have bought this product, if I’d known you were getting paid to promote it,” apologize profusely and profoundly and refund their money and promise that you will never again recommend a product without making it crystal clear that you are getting paid to do so, and then *keep* that promise as if your financial life depended upon it … because it does.

If somebody says, “I would never have bought this product, if I’d known that the results those people in the testimonials got with it weren’t the kind of results that an average person like me could get,” apologize profusely and profoundly and refund their money and promise that you will never again publish a testimonial without making it crystal clear that the person who got those great results is extra-ordinary in some way that most people aren’t, and then *keep* that promise as if your financial life depended upon it … because it does.

*You* (and other other marketers like you) are on the *inside* … you are *privy* to inside information … you *know* an affiliate pitch when you see one … you *know* — or probably rightly assume — that 99 out of 100 testimonials are “embroidered” to some extent … and you make your purchasing decisions accordingly.

But someone who is *not* on the inside — who takes these things at face value — these are the people the FTC regulations are seeking to protect.

Look at the SEC:

There is one set of rules for people with less than $100,000 to invest, because the law presumes that they are “unsophisticated” investors, so it requires you to *thoroughly* spell things out for them.

And then there is another set of rules for people with more than $100,000 to invest, because the law presumes that they are “sophisticated” investors, so it gives you a little more leeway.

Meaning …

If you have a mailing list of 5,000 “inner circle” coaching clients, let’s say, who are very well up to speed on all your tactics, then the law is going to allow you to take certain liberties with them that it wouldn’t allow you to take with the man on the street — with the “newbie” — because they are *already* in the know, whereas the newbie isn’t.

It all comes down to making an effort to get to know your prospect, so that you can offer him something that he needs, wants and can afford to buy.

The days when “anything goes” in an effort to transfer money from his pocket to yours are long gone.

And so they should be.

Selling things is actually very easy. You don’t need to try all your high-pressure, neuro-linguistic tricks on people. Just give them something for free that delights them … and then follow it up with something for pay that delights them even more.

Simple!

🙂