Ethical considerations & CPA.

Personally, I stay away from Black Hat methods that you mentioned. I try to keep things all White Hat.

I'm promoting CPA offers that I have researched and know to be legit.

The best way I can put is that just like in SEO, both white hat and black hat can bring in results. Obviously only one is ethical and generally speaking one of the two tends to bring in results faster but at the same time, the unethical one can get you in trouble in the long run and ruins the Internet's reputation by misleading users. With all that said, it's possible to make money without using unethical CPA tactics, but it will probably require more work however, it should prove more rewarding in the long run and you won't have to worry about breaking any TOS or misleading users.

I agree with Hyaku. I am an above average computer user and if I feel it is possible to get mislead by the offer (hidden fees, astronomical recurring billing after a 'free trial' etc) I will not promote that offer. Unfortunately for me that includes a lot of the offers out there, but I would rather live more than comfortably like I do promoting offers I am comfortable with than rake in 10x as much with offers I am uncomfortable with.

Yes users should read fine print and understand everything before they throw out their cc, but the advertiser should be responsible and sell their product in a salesy way without blatenly misleading.

Its a balance that every marketer must deal with. I dont promote offers that my mom or grandmother may fall for.

Interested in this discussion. I also in dilemma whether want to continue to promote those "free trial offer" or not. I've did some search on google and found that many users are very hard to cancel their CC subscription to those so called free trial offer. I'm felt guilty on that scenario.

Yes I can say it easier to make money through CPA compare to clickbank or others affiliate program that required our visitor to buy, but I think I'm rather preferred to promote clickbank product because they have 60 days money back guarantee and easy for customer to get refund if they're not satisfied with the product.

Ethics and integrity are important, just not for sleeping, but for the entire performance marketing niche online. If Big Brand Advertiser's see that practices mentioned above such as farming Craigslist are yielding low quality returns and costing them to lose brand quality associations enjoyed in other channels, they will just pack in their budgets and go to PPC or display. And that would be a shame as TV budgets are beginning to splinter and the fallout is raining on the online ad space, in which performance is an option.

The Advertiser's themselves though need to also think about how they are giving Performance Marketing a black eye by developing more and more insidious and ridiculous incentivized campaigns. Compare Coke vs Pepsi turns into a 15 page ordeal for the end user to get a non-existent coupon. I fully understand the data model that these Advertisers and their representing Networks work under, but in my experience the data collected and the supposed "behavioral insights" gleaned apply to only a small subset of the data that actually buy anything. Thus the net result is an opt out and an Advertiser that ultimately will not be a long term player.

The decision for a Publisher to run or not to run a campaign will always be subjective. For our part, myself and the MONKS at Offeratti, we screen our Advertisers offers as hard as we do our Publishers. This is why we only offer campaigns where there is a no questions asked refund policy and a clear working Customer Service phone number and email to unsubscribe. Believe it or not, good advertisers really do not want people who do not want their product and are happy to return it without hassle. As a network, we are concerned about intergity and truth in adversing, not only because the FTC is cracking down on deceptive practices, but also the fact that we want to sleep at night knowing that we offer consumers the best choices for their needs and stand behind them. Besides, Advertisers that do not adhere to best practices usually go belly up and end up not paying us which makes it difficult to pay publishers. By screening out for only the best Advertisers (like Shawn Casey, Justin Blake, and others) we sleep at night just fine and our publishers do too.

Hope this helps...

damn. you are truly a monk when it comes to ethical problem. can i be a monk too? haha

Post must have been taken down, sorry

If you are doing the right things, move ahead with a clear mind know your targets and get paid after a job completion. Every thing gives you satisfaction.

All you need is to set ethical parameters for you.