Is It Just Me Or Do Most WSO'S Seem To Be Junk These Days?

[sethczerepak]

Originally Posted by tshipp

Stop buying them. If you can't stop yourself from pulling out your wallet for junk, avoid visiting the wso section.

Ouch. Rough delivery there...but it's true.

I suspect WSOs might appear to be junk if you already know what's in them...but what about for the people who are just getting started? Not everyone's ready for advanced stuff...you have to roll over and fart in your crib a few times before you're ready for the Olympics. If you're having a hard time finding stuff that you don't already know...it's time to quit buying and start USING what you know.

[dagaul101]

Unfortunately so many people are quick to jump on the "Get rich quick" schemes with no regard that they are just rehashing the same old stuff, a pity for their buyers

[Spyder77]

Originally Posted by Peter Gehr

Furthermore, most warriors are quite fair in that if you are not satisfied, a refund is offered and honored.

50% true.

There was a thread recently from a WSO seller who was very PO'd off that someone requested a refund on his $7 WSO within a couple minutes of downloading it. This created a thread full of angst toward people who refund, and recommendations to blacklist anyone who requests a refund. This also led to suggestions about creating a "list" whereby any WSO seller can add the info to this master list so that every WSO seller who opts into it can pre-emptively block refunders.

I've never bought a WSO. I've been given two WSOs to review, and provided reviews of both. No payment or favour of any kind was asked. I reviewed both before that thread came up, and in fairness to the WSO sellers I reviewed for, neither commented in that thread.

However, after reading that thread, and knowing that about 2-6% of all digital downloaders will refund (the price of doing business and it isn't unique to IM) for whatever reason (legit or otherwise), I'm not buying a WSO from anyone. Nor doing any more reviews.

A 100% satisfaction, no hassles guarantee with a hidden policy such as this is not what the policy claims to be. It may be in a literal sense, but not from the spirit of "good faith" such a guarantee implies.

A valid comparison is to my favourite electronics store that offers a 30 day no questions, no hassles, cash refund policy. I buy there because they are true to their word: out of the many products I've bought there over a 10 year period, I've had to return 2 of them. They are a fraction of the money I've spent there. If the unspoken part of the policy was that I'd be banned from the store if I had to take them up their guarantee, not only would they have lost my repeat business (which in large part is do to the reassurance the guarantee gives), but they never would have gotten any of my business to begin with.

It amazes me that while a big box chain can eat this on a physical product that is going to require expense on repackaging/returns, they're able to see the big picture and simply eat this as a cost of doing business because they know that their REAL guarantee will more than offset the modest expense incurred through the handful of refunds issued. Yet WSO sellers, who incur no expense, and have the same refund rate as every other niche in the digital download game, resort to these underhanded tactics. And it is underhanded - no matter how you parse it. If they stated that along with their guarantee, then fine - that's transparent and the person who opts to download based on this "guarantee" is well aware then of exactly what it entails. Until then, its an underhanded practice that while not dishonest, is not transparent and is very much at odds with the how they bill their guarantee.

And the WSO sellers who don't like that can flame away because:

a) I'm not in your niche and have no interest in getting into it. The IM niche today is very reminiscent to me of the dotcom bubble just before it popped.

b) I've dealt with more face to face in my life to be cowed by someone who will resort to flaming because they don't like my point of view. Having dealt with death threats from psychopaths in my prior line of work, forum attacks are about as intimidating as a loose hamster.

-Spyder

[paulgl]

How about this gem:
http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...ccounts-2.html

I'll say it: Don't waste your money on that thing.

Paul

[dark witness]

For me personally I find the most value I get from WSO's now is in the form of software.

I would not say they are all junk, but it's getting to the point that the big dogs talk about how easy it is to make a wso and they show the flashy income sheet and all the newbies run off to make their own wso. Are we really going to get the high level of quality ? ... Na, I don't think so.

What I find is that most wso's are about the same subjects but a lot of them point to different resources and thats where the money is for me.

The other big plus is the software side. There are some really great WP themes, plugins and other softwares that are more then worth the price. That is what I look out for now.

Most of the so called 10k a month system, 3k a week, 2k a day and the rest I just don't find useful so I have stopped buying them. Many I have tried to get to work but not seen the same sort of results.

Buy the ones that relate to what you are interested in.
take them apart and add the useful info into your business model.

put the info into practice and leave the rest alone..

Thats what I do now.

[High Horsepower]

Originally Posted by Spyder77

50% true.

I'll defend the other 50%

There was a thread recently from a WSO seller who was very PO'd off that someone requested a refund on his $7 WSO within a couple minutes of downloading it. This created a thread full of angst toward people who refund, and recommendations to blacklist anyone who requests a refund. This also led to suggestions about creating a "list" whereby any WSO seller can add the info to this master list so that every WSO seller who opts into it can pre-emptively block refunders.

That seller will soon be out of the WSO business, that's how the marketplace works.

I've never bought a WSO. I've been given two WSOs to review, and provided reviews of both. No payment or favour of any kind was asked. I reviewed both before that thread came up, and in fairness to the WSO sellers I reviewed for, neither commented in that thread.

However, after reading that thread, and knowing that about 2-6% of all digital downloaders will refund (the price of doing business and it isn't unique to IM) for whatever reason (legit or otherwise), I'm not buying a WSO from anyone. Nor doing any more reviews.

There's a saying in Marketing "speed is money." I'm willing to spend money to ramp up my knowledge vs trying to learn it on my own. Don't tell me you can find it all here, cuase that ain't true.

A 100% satisfaction, no hassles guarantee with a hidden policy such as this is not what the policy claims to be. It may be in a literal sense, but not from the spirit of "good faith" such a guarantee implies.

We can agree on this. I think the WSO section should make it mandatory for most products (maybe not services) to have a "30 Day No Questions asked refund Guarantee. I offer 60 Days No Questions asked and I have no problems. Most buyers are honest and will not try and take advantage of sellers. I normally will not buy a WSO unless it has a stong refund policy.

A valid comparison is to my favourite electronics store that offers a 30 day no questions, no hassles, cash refund policy. I buy there because they are true to their word: out of the many products I've bought there over a 10 year period, I've had to return 2 of them. They are a fraction of the money I've spent there. If the unspoken part of the policy was that I'd be banned from the store if I had to take them up their guarantee, not only would they have lost my repeat business (which in large part is do to the reassurance the guarantee gives), but they never would have gotten any of my business to begin with.

Funny you should mention that, but a few Fortune 1000 companies have now started doing just this. Not banned from the store, but they limit refunds. If a buyer asked me for 2 or more refunds then I too would block them from any more purchases.

It amazes me that while a big box chain can eat this on a physical product that is going to require expense on repackaging/returns, they're able to see the big picture and simply eat this as a cost of doing business because they know that their REAL guarantee will more than offset the modest expense incurred through the handful of refunds issued.

That's not always the case. Many stores are now asking for a 15%, 20%, and 30% restocking fee.

Yet WSO sellers, who incur no expense, and have the same refund rate as every other niche in the digital download game, resort to these underhanded tactics.

That's not true either.

And it is underhanded - no matter how you parse it. If they stated that along with their guarantee, then fine - that's transparent and the person who opts to download based on this "guarantee" is well aware then of exactly what it entails. Until then, its an underhanded practice that while not dishonest, is not transparent and is very much at odds with the how they bill their guarantee.

I agree.

And the WSO sellers who don't like that can flame away because:

a) I'm not in your niche and have no interest in getting into it. The IM niche today is very reminiscent to me of the dotcom bubble just before it popped.

b) I've dealt with more face to face in my life to be cowed by someone who will resort to flaming because they don't like my point of view. Having dealt with death threats from psychopaths in my prior line of work, forum attacks are about as intimidating as a loose hamster.

-Spyder

Anwers above in Red. Sorry to see you've limited your mindset to NEVER purchasing a WSO. I can assure everyone reading this there are MANY fine WSO's from sellers who care, I'm one of them.

My leaning and income curve have been rapidly advanced by learning from others.

Richard

[Spyder77]

Originally Posted by High Horsepower

Anwers above in Red. Sorry to see you've limited your mindset to NEVER purchasing a WSO. I can assure everyone reading this there are MANY fine WSO's from sellers who care, I'm one of them.

My leaning and income curve have been rapidly advanced by learning from others.

Richard

Your reply is fair enough and I can see your point of view. What turned me off was this idea that sprung up - based on one WSO's post about being pissed off because one person asked for his money back on a $7 WSO - was the tone adopted by those involved in the discussion (almost all WSO sellers) that culminated in this idea of a secret list where anyone seller can add someone who actually uses their money back guarantee, to a master blacklist that prevents them from buying another WSO.

That is very anti-free market, very monopolistic trending, and if that's how they treat someone who, for whatever reason, uses the guarantee they offer, then it isn't worth spit. None of them mention that anywhere in their ad copy, instead they stress their "no hassles, 100% satisfaction or money back."

I can understand why someone wouldn't want to essentially give their product away to a serial refunder. At the same time, not everyone who requests a refund - and I don't need to be a WSO seller or buyer to realize this - is doing so for the purposes of getting something for nothing. Yet a policy like this, and especially the talk of a "secret master blacklist," really doesn't do anything to encourage anyone to read a guarantee as meaning jack squat - other than as a pure sales tool that has the added advantage of allowing people to back up garbage products with a fake guarantee where they can then tell the person "yup, you want your money back, no problem, but you'll never buy another WSO from anyone as you're blacklisted." It just tars everyone with the same brush and everyone pays the same price because of a few dickheads who buy something they never intend to pay for.

I'm not doing business with people who believe that penalizing everyone while wrapping their product around a "guarantee" which, when this is the cost of it, is really total BS and not sound marketing. It also makes me think their product is more likely to be crap.

Fortunately the WF is much greater than the WSO forum, which is just one part of it and never the part that drew me here. So in the end its no loss to me, and the WSO I might have bought over the next few months isn't going to be any loss to the WSO segment of the WF.

That's their idea of business, mine is very different, and that's really all there is to it.

You make fair points, but just watching the interplay in that thread really soured me from WSOs. I bit my tongue, but after seeing so many threads like this lately, its clear I'm not the only one who sees some flaws there. The getting blacklisted because you bought one of the crappy ones and actually had the nerve to ask for your money back when it turned out to be nothing but hype (my reservation that has kept me from buying) is just the latest twist to ice the cake.

-Sypder

[High Horsepower]

Spyder77,

Don't let one idiot WSO seller stop you from taking advantage of learning.

There are always bad apples in anything we do in life. If someone treated me like that I would dispute my refund with PP and never deal with that person again.

Like every marketplace, a Bad WSO seller will get a reputation very fast, and like you, members will be turned off from these idiots.

I bought the "WSO of the Day" a few hours ago, it's very good: http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...1-39-days.html (non affiliate link)

I never buy the WSO of the Day, but this one is worthy.

It's about SEO, well worth the $9.90 he's asking for it. I left a review (which I rarely do). There are many good people here on the WF who not only contribute to the daily threads but they also do WSO's.

I have spent thousands on WSO's over the last year, I can assure you it increased my learning curve, increased my income, and allowed me a better lifestyle.

Members need to research a WSO seller before they buy. If I don't know the poster I will research their post and see what they contribute. I think it's fairly easy to see who cares and who doens't.

Like I stated before, I can't remember when I purchased a WSO without a Guarantee. I've asked for very few refunds, probably less than 3%.

Don't limit yourself, in fact here is another WSO I'm buying in 5 minutes: Stupid WordPress Mistakes! (YOU are making right now)... and how to avoid them (non affiliate link)

This guy Istvan is considered the WordPress guru around here, you're darn right I'm paying this guy $12 to get his knowledge of 7 years of being a WP expert.

Richard

[Spyder77]

Point well taken Richard, and a case of my reacting with a nuke where a tactical missile would be in my best interest. Your suggestions are good ones and they come back to doing due diligence before buying by using the seller's posting history to get a feeling for what he'll likely be providing and how he (or she) regards and treats their customers.

That particular thread I referred to in an earlier post was really off putting, and I don't think those who contributed in it realized just how much it was. The irony was that one WSO seller is someone, that thread aside, I had developed a respect for and an interest in her WSO. I may still buy it at some point, but it'll be after thinking it over more carefully than I would have otherwise - and which may not be a bad thing as any WSO should be researched carefully rather than relying on ad copy and reviews alone.

And its definitely not in my best interests (nor fair to them) to be swayed against all WSOs based on remarks made from a small minority of WSO sellers.

Thanks for taking the time to point out valid points I'd overlooked. I agree with what you've written and those are good guidelines I'll use for selecting which WSOs to buy.

-Spyder

Originally Posted by High Horsepower

Spyder77,

Don't let one idiot WSO seller stop you from taking advantage of learning.

There are always bad apples in anything we do in life. If someone treated me like that I would dispute my refund with PP and never deal with that person again.

Like every marketplace, a Bad WSO seller will get a reputation very fast, and like you, members will be turned off from these idiots.

I bought the "WSO of the Day" a few hours ago, it's very good: http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...1-39-days.html (non affiliate link)

I never buy the WSO of the Day, but this one is worthy.

It's about SEO, well worth the $9.90 he's asking for it. I left a review (which I rarely do). There are many good people here on the WF who not only contribute to the daily threads but they also do WSO's.

I have spent thousands on WSO's over the last year, I can assure you it increased my learning curve, increased my income, and allowed me a better lifestyle.

Members need to research a WSO seller before they buy. If I don't know the poster I will research their post and see what they contribute. I think it's fairly easy to see who cares and who doens't.

Like I stated before, I can't remember when I purchased a WSO without a Guarantee. I've asked for very few refunds, probably less than 3%.

Don't limit yourself, in fact here is another WSO I'm buying in 5 minutes: Stupid WordPress Mistakes! (YOU are making right now)... and how to avoid them (non affiliate link)

This guy Istvan is considered the WordPress guru around here, you're darn right I'm paying this guy $12 to get his knowledge of 7 years of being a WP expert.

Richard

[Mike Anthony]

Originally Posted by paulgl

Mike Anthony, I should have been read:
The problem is more related to people not doing a little free research before
pulling out the ol' wallet. Hasn't Mike Anthony duly noted that before?

rant was fine Paul. You think I don't know I rant? Plus it gave me an opportunity to poke fun at myself. However I got two thanks and I can't figure out if they got the joke or were just agreeing that I should be banned.

Probably the latter.

[Mike Anthony]

Originally Posted by Spyder77

This also led to suggestions about creating a "list" whereby any WSO seller can add the info to this master list so that every WSO seller who opts into it can pre-emptively block refunders.

Any seller that implements such a list can go fly a kite. he won't be keeping or getting my money regardless. I don't care if its a $4 product -you lie to me in your sales copy and I am asking and getting my money back.

However

I don't bother much with posting my request in the offer thread. In some of the SEO WSos the seller is popular because he has made JV relationships with people to leverage their "testimonials". ranting or complaining isn't going to do anything but have the same people jump back in to tell you how wrong you are are and add more testimonials. Plus the sheep are not going to believe their SEO hero doesn't know what they are talking about so its pointless.

Request your refund by PM and get your money back. You will get it because they don't want the possibility of dealing with your post in their sales thread and leave it there.

and heres a tip. Look for the WSOs that are NOT as popular. A lot of the time they are the ones that spent time working on their product rather than lining up JVs that make their next WSO launch look like the greatest secret to blow up on WF.