Some people say all marketers are liars, all salesmanship is deception, and all persuasion is manipulation. As an ethical person whose job involves marketing, you may struggle sometimes with the question of whether you're violating your own principles.

Obviously, some marketers are liars, some salesmen are deceivers, and some persuasive techniques are manipulative.

But is...
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Internet marketing has an uphill battle to fight if it's ever going to shed the negative side of its wild west culture.

We've all seen sales letters packed with fake "proof of income" screenshots, false claims, false scarcity, fake testimonials...you get the idea.

It seems like half the products in the internet marketing market (if...
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A few days ago in my "Monday Question" post about cleaning up internet marketing, I mentioned Sylvie Fortin's Internet Marketing Sins. If you haven't read it, please go there and get your copy now (it's free -- no opt-in required).

Back in 2008, Sylvie published Internet Marketing Sins, listing 15 practices that she believed were...
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Internet marketers don't have the best reputation. And if you look at some of the techniques that are not only prevalent, but openly taught and recommended, it's no wonder.

Many of the big-name "gurus" are either consciously raking unsuspecting customers over the coals, or are so caught up in their own inner-circle echo chambers that...
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I feel a rant coming on.

Have you ever had a high-priced product offered to you as an opportunity to make money using "other people's money"? The pitch goes something like this:

Pay for our $5,000 product with your credit card. Sure, you'll pay your credit card company X% interest. But once you're through with...
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Yesterday, I posted a list of 12 blogs I follow and why I read and recommend them. The authors of 3 of them posted comments. If I were a "bootstrap guru" (someone who takes a small success, blows it out of proportion, sells it as a money-making system, and uses those sales as proof of...
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I may not be posting for the next few days. Before signing off for the holiday, I thought I'd leave a Thanksgiving message -- 7 ways internet marketing is like Thanksgiving.

#1 Most of what we think we know about it is a myth.

The myths of Thanksgiving start with it's beginnings. Most of us...
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I got an email from my blog today asking me to moderate a comment. Here are a few excerpts:

Author : chad darwin...

My name is John...

I was looking in the search engines and seen your site your Alexa traffic rank is ****** [no, I didn't redact the numbers -- the comment actually contained...
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Harris Fellman picked the wrong day to bug me -- I'm in a bit of a ranty mood (hmm, my spellchecker doesn't like the word "ranty". I've got a few choice words for that spell checker! Just kidding.)

This morning, I got an email from Harris promoting somebody else's webinar. I clicked a URL in...
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You've seen it before, even if you didn't know it. The sales page screams "Buy now! Only 100 23 copies left!" Then you come back a month later and it still says "Buy now! Only 100 23 copies left!" Either the product ain't selling or somebody's lying.

One of the latest big sellers on ClickBank...
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