Fake Testimonials Unethical?

[ghyphena]

I'd like the collective WF views on this subject:

No, this isn't a "gee, um, is it wrong to make up testimonials" question. I hope to address the issue on a somewhat more sophisticated level.

Bear in mind I am talking about moral and ethical standards, not FTC regs and laws.

Let me lay down some points to ponder, and then I'd like to hear your opinions on the matter.

1. Review-Affiliate Testimonials

So, to start off, here's an acceptable practice: you come up with a product, wrangle some JV partners and launch. Your JV partners notice you lack testimonials and kindly offer to write one for you - hey, they get to show support *and* get a linkback out of it. It's win-win. We've all been there.

So now you have a beautifully-written sales page filled with smiling faces of IMers endorsing your product. Superb.

Problem is, most of them are also actively promoting it as your affiliates. They have a vested interest in your conversion rate going up. You might go as far as to suggest that some of them might colour you a brighter shade of pink than they would otherwise.

My question - given that the reading prospect is not informed that a certain testimonial (or testimonials) comes from someone with a financial interest in a higher conversion rate... what is the moral/ethical difference between that and you just fabricating a testimonial?

Obviously, one is legal and one is not - but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about moral and ethical concerns only. I'm also not saying it's exactly the same thing morally - but it's something to think about.

2. PLR Testimonials

You buy a PLR product and, like any such self-respecting offering, it comes with a ready made "killer" sales letter. You scan it to assess the cost of reparation and jump for joy: lo and behold, it even comes with ready-made testimonials.

Never mind the fact that you ain't got 'em on file if anyone should ever ask... you can't even know if they're real or if you're going to be rolling with someone else's fiction. Do you use them; masquerade them as your own?

Allow me to further develop the idea with two auxiliary points (and then I'll be done):

a) Turning a blind eye to the possibility of the testimonial being a fake.

Specifically, does this "plausible deniability" isolate you morally from the responsibility you bear if the testimonial is indeed made-up?

And *if so* - i.e. if you are morally protected... and... as it happens the testimonial turns out to be a fabrication - what is then the moral difference between using it and making it up yourself?

Is your lack of knowledge all that stands between you and moral culpability?

b) Product vs publisher testimonials.

The substance of the testimonial, in my opinion, comes into play *even if* you think that all the other considerations I've raised are negligible.

There is a difference - at least as far as I am concerned - between the two following scenarios:

---
i) I take

"John, I love 'Ultimate Weedkilling Secrets' - the first day I used it I killed all the weeds in my garden."

and turn it to

"Gil-Ad, I love 'Ultimate Weedkilling Secrets' - the first day I used it I killed all the weeds in my garden."
---

compare with

---
ii) I take

"John is the end-all weedkilling expert. I'd trust him to kill any weed."

and I turn it to

"Gil-Ad is the end-all weedkilling expert. I'd trust him to kill any weed."
---

In my opinion even if example (i) is somehow acceptable, (ii) is not for one simple reason - example (i) still applies to the PLR product being sold... but (ii) no longer applies to the person doing the selling.

I welcome contrasting opinions. What do you guys think?

- Gil-Ad

[ryanman]

Even ethical testimonials might not be ethical at all. You see it all over this and other forums...Some guy would offer free copies of his ebook before the launch and he gets tons of great testimonials.

But are they all honest?

Not really!

I have bought so many WSO'S which had great testimonials from many reputed warriors but when I went through the content it wasn't even 1% of what people were saying.

people get paid for their opinion...No wait! People get paid for their "POSITIVE OPINION".

And a good example of this is in the mainstream itself...You see a Tv advertisement for Mc donalds...They show you how tasty all their stuff is and how everyone goes to mc donalds.

Yet the fact is...Their food is slow poison. But they are one of the biggest companies out there. Although they are truly selling slow poison...By packaging it right.

[Christophe Young]

I don't know about others but I NEVER read testimonials. I always assume they are either fake, or the client was "Persuaded" to write a glowing review.

I do wonder about those outside of the IM circle, like if the average Joe reads them and is influenced by their content. Probably so.

[cbright]

I think testimonials with pictures of actual people work. If people see someone elses face saying this about that. Then I think it tends to draw a little trust out of the potential buyer

[Bombora]

The fact of the matter is that even if they are real nobody is going to put anything but a glowing review on their site so testimonials are nothing but a sales pitch. If someone had 100% real testimonials on their site then that's cool but its still not an accurate representation - you know they picked that certain one because it was great.

[SuiteJ]

I totally agree with you on the product vs. publisher point.

What really bugs me are the vague / generic testimonials that often will come outside of an Internet Marketing convention/seminar. It's so blatantly obvious and almost always the same "testimonial"...

you know the ones...

"wow! what John Doe just revealed at this seminar should never have been released to the public, I can't believe he did that (really? even though you paid $3k to get in the door? lol). It changed my life and was worth 20 times the amount I paid. If you're not buying everything from John Doe, you're leaving money on the table....I can't wait to get home and put it into action."

Sometimes I think they just pull random people out of the hotel lobby that didn't even attend the seminar and pay them $100 to say something vague. lol

Also, it depends on the product and what it does. If I saw a video testimonial from "Gil-Ad" actually showing the results of the weed killer in her backyard, I'd be more inclined to believe in it....but that doesn't really hold weight with IM digital "make money" products...I think we all know that Clickbank, Paypal, screenshots can't be trusted...so I usually try and ask peers (that I trust) if they've used it before and make a decision based on their response.

Great thread/topic!
Cheers
Jay

[Marhelper]

I really do not think this question even has to be asked ... of course! I too ignore testimonials unless I know the people testifying.

[ghyphena]

Originally Posted by ryanman

Even ethical testimonials might not be ethical at all. You see it all over this and other forums...Some guy would offer free copies of his ebook before the launch and he gets tons of great testimonials.

But are they all honest?

Not really!

I have bought so many WSO'S which had great testimonials from many reputed warriors but when I went through the content it wasn't even 1% of what people were saying.

people get paid for their opinion...No wait! People get paid for their "POSITIVE OPINION".

And a good example of this is in the mainstream itself...You see a Tv advertisement for Mc donalds...They show you how tasty all their stuff is and how everyone goes to mc donalds.

Yet the fact is...Their food is slow poison. But they are one of the biggest companies out there. Although they are truly selling slow poison...By packaging it right.

Re: "positive opinion", bear in mind nobody's going to put negative testimonials on their sales page. However, I certainly agree that there's some pressure on the individual who is being paid to come up with something positive rather than totally neutral

PS - Just because something is slow poison doesn't mean it's not tasty. Exhibit A: Al-co-hol

[ghyphena]

Originally Posted by Christophe Young

I don't know about others but I NEVER read testimonials. I always assume they are either fake, or the client was "Persuaded" to write a glowing review.

I do wonder about those outside of the IM circle, like if the average Joe reads them and is influenced by their content. Probably so.

Maybe that's just because we're jaded IM-ers. I have the same inclination except when I'm looking at non-IM products; then I tend to put more weight on the testimonials.

Having said that, John Carlton says that testimonials are like bullets.... they flip sales... so maybe it really is just because we're in a jaded and cynical industry.

[ghyphena]

Originally Posted by cbright

I think testimonials with pictures of actual people work. If people see someone elses face saying this about that. Then I think it tends to draw a little trust out of the potential buyer

Full names, addresses and occupations are meant to help too.

Mary Greene, Accountant, Salt Lake City UT seems much more credible than "Mary G, Utah"

[ghyphena]

Originally Posted by SuiteJ

I totally agree with you on the product vs. publisher point.

What really bugs me are the vague / generic testimonials that often will come outside of an Internet Marketing convention/seminar. It's so blatantly obvious and almost always the same "testimonial"...

you know the ones...

"wow! what John Doe just revealed at this seminar should never have been released to the public, I can't believe he did that (really? even though you paid $3k to get in the door? lol). It changed my life and was worth 20 times the amount I paid. If you're not buying everything from John Doe, you're leaving money on the table....I can't wait to get home and put it into action."

Sometimes I think they just pull random people out of the hotel lobby that didn't even attend the seminar and pay them $100 to say something vague. lol

Also, it depends on the product and what it does. If I saw a video testimonial from "Gil-Ad" actually showing the results of the weed killer in her backyard, I'd be more inclined to believe in it....but that doesn't really hold weight with IM digital "make money" products...I think we all know that Clickbank, Paypal, screenshots can't be trusted...so I usually try and ask peers (that I trust) if they've used it before and make a decision based on their response.

Great thread/topic!
Cheers
Jay

First of all, ignore the slightly effeminate origami icon - Gil-Ad is a man's name, based on the Hebrew biblical name but corrupted with a hyphen to mean "Joy Forever".

It's an easy mistake to make.

Second... I know what you mean about the "hotel lobby" testimonial (perfect example, btw).... sometimes it feels like you could take any IM testimonial, any Clickbank product and just mix and match with no-one noticing.

But like I said in a previous reply, maybe it's just the MMO niche. In the "weedkiller" testimonial - do you need to see a weed-free garden on video to be convinced? In theory you could easily fake that too... just have no weeds in the first place but then you're firmly in the realm of lying.

Jaded/cynical audience notwithstanding, I've read that an effective testimonial is one that offers specific benefit-oriented result... I suppose that's why income screenshots are so popular. The problem is they're also easy to manufacture, so the audience grows accustomed to ignoring them.

[scarcius121]

Maybe the testimonials would be more believable if they also had some cons in opposition to all the pros? But, who would post a testimonial with anything negative toward their product/company?

[ghyphena]

Originally Posted by Marhelper

I really do not think this question even has to be asked ... of course! I too ignore testimonials unless I know the people testifying.

Surely you've found that there's a certain art to reading testimonials... after a while you realize that things like "This looks really promising" means "I don't have anything to show for it".... and "Just one of Gil-Ad's strategies made me $1,514" means "I already had a list of 200k+"...

Kind of like how real estate agents see through property descriptions:

"Beautiful character loft apartment in desirable location close to good transport links" means "Tiny attic in the middle of nowhere". You know what I mean.

[Christophe Young]

Originally Posted by scarcius121

Maybe the testimonials would be more believable if they also had some cons in opposition to all the pros? But, who would post a testimonial with anything negative toward their product/company?

Good point! Stating both positives AND negatives makes the review a LOT more credible. That's why sites like tripadvisor with real customer reviews are so great. You have real unbiased reviews of products and services.

[SuiteJ]

Originally Posted by ghyphena

First of all, ignore the slightly effeminate origami icon - Gil-Ad is a man's name, based on the Hebrew biblical name but corrupted with a hyphen to mean "Joy Forever".

It's an easy mistake to make.

LOL. Sorry about that, I wrote "her" without even 'checking". My bad, sir!

LOL also @ "just have no weeds in the first place" for the video.

Cheers
Jay

[Troy_Phillips]

One of the highest converting sp's I ever ran went like this concerning testimonials .

I think your product is the best thing since sliced bread . I used it and in twenty four hours, not only did it do what your sales page stated, as an added bonus my acne dried up. Never before have I bought a make money from home course and woke up to a full pay pal account (and clear skin)

Troy , I think you rock. Your advice was spot on and with your good looks , you should really think about doing infomercials .

Barbara ****ulater
Paris , Texas

Then directly under this testimonial a highlighted subtitle .

This testimonial is fake ! sadly so is many you read online today .

Even if this was true .... the results would not be typical.

You are not Barbara . If Barbara was real, she could have several things working in her favor that you do not.

Lets discuss how this worked for me and how I think it could work for you .

As I said , although this is not the exact wording from the original sp, this sp converted like crazy

[Michael Oksa]

If you send them directly to an affiliate page, hosted by the product creator, then you could possibly claim plausible deniability.

Changing the first name in a ready-made testimonial, to me, is not ethical. The testimonial was not addressed to you.

You could argue that the original "could" have been made up, but two wrongs don't make a right. Changing it and saying it's okay because the original might have been fake doesn't sit right with me.

Any testimonial addressed to you, can be used. By changing the first name you aren't implying anything, you're being dishonest.

To be clear, I'm not saying you're doing these things, just palying off your examples.

All the best,
Michael

[mikemcmillan]

Yes, a good number of the testimonials (especially in the IM niche) come from JV partners. Okay, put that aside. There are also tons and tons of professional testimonial givers who submit testimonials for products they never even bought just to get their name and website URL into highly visited sales pages for popular products.

And--like others have said, commercials on TV are no better. Look at how many weight loss commercials feature young women telling how they lost 40 pounds within 6 months of using a product--and they have a 8 month old baby laying next to them in a chair. Of course they lost weight, they had a child recently!

Even the guru's testimonials are suspect. Someone might say, "Hey, great program, within two weeks of getting it I took in $65,000 within 3 days." So you do a little research and find yes--they did make that much money--they were in the first week of their own product launch!

Anyway, I give absolutely no credence to any testimonials anyway. They mean nothing to me.

[ppcpimp]

I think the testimonials can be taken a little too far some times but in the end the burden is on the consumer to research the product. From Jessica Simpson and P. Diddy telling us how great their acne solution is to the fake acai blogs, the consumer has to make a decision on how reliable any testimonial is.

[ghyphena]

@Michael - I took it in the spirit intended. Just to be clear, I don't endorse any of these practices... and I didn't post this to seek moral validation

I wasn't arguing that if the testimonial was made up then two wrongs make a right... rather that they make a stickier, messier wrong...

@mike - spot on, I think. You could visit the Clickbank MMO section and see the same handful of smiling faces over and over again.

Re: income claims, I had to smile the other day when I saw Jeff Paul's Shortcut to Internet Millions infomercial and heard "Shawn C" gave a rave account of how he made some five figures after following Jeff's advice... without mentioning that he was (a) an experienced marketer with (b) a six-figure list of his own...

Caveat emptor, indeed.

[davidomni]

Its funny how often this tactic is used.

Just look at affiliate's for Clickbank luanches (or other)

They register a domain, usually _product-name_scam
or product-name_review

Then they "review" it.

Funny thing about this is, most of the time
they havn't even gone through the product themselves
and are just trying to pre-sell to make a quick buck.

Completely unethical.
No wonder why customers are pissed.

Cheers.

[PersonalAssistantChick]

Originally Posted by Troy_Phillips

One of the highest converting sp's I ever ran went like this concerning testimonials .

I think your product is the best thing since sliced bread . I used it and in twenty four hours, not only did it do what your sales page stated, as an added bonus my acne dried up. Never before have I bought a make money from home course and woke up to a full pay pal account (and clear skin)

Troy , I think you rock. Your advice was spot on and with your good looks , you should really think about doing infomercials .

Barbara ****ulater
Paris , Texas

Then directly under this testimonial a highlighted subtitle .

This testimonial is fake ! sadly so is many you read online today .

Even if this was true .... the results would not be typical.

You are not Barbara . If Barbara was real, she could have several things working in her favor that you do not.

Lets discuss how this worked for me and how I think it could work for you .

As I said , although this is not the exact wording from the original sp, this sp converted like crazy

I think this is an awesome example of great copywriting, and the difference good writing can make to sales. Brilliant!

Originally Posted by Christophe Young

I don't know about others but I NEVER read testimonials. I always assume they are either fake, or the client was "Persuaded" to write a glowing review.

I do wonder about those outside of the IM circle, like if the average Joe reads them and is influenced by their content. Probably so.

I have to agree, before I was involved in internet marketing testimonials used to be somewhat convincing, however knowing what I do now I have to say that I don't look at them. I put more weight on what is said about the product by those with experience, for example on this forum.

[Martin Luxton]

I used to waste time on stuff like this. Buy the product. If it's good, promote it.

Just so you don't think I'm being rude or too abrupt, here's some comments addressing your concerns:

1. If people are happy to endorse your product, let them. When I review something, I criticise as well. If all your reviewers say only positive things with no constructive criticism (not intended for publication) maybe you should think twice about using them.

2. When I see a product endorsed by all the usual suspects I won't touch it with a barge pole, particularly if I know they are JV partners.

3. If you are concerned about promoting a product which appears to have fake testimonials either
a) Don't promote it
b) Ask the product owner for original copies of the testimonials. If they can't be provided and checked, revert to a)

Martin

[MikeHumphreys]

As a professional copywriter, I've consulted with an attorney on this topic more than once.

Here's a few key points to remember:

1) Anything that is on your sales letter or your website, you are 100% responsible for. So if it's a phony testimonial or leads to defraud the consumer, then the U.S. government (FTC specifically) holds you liable... meaning either massive fine or even jail.

2) You can correct things like typos in a testimonial. You can not change a customer testimonial without their written permission. It is okay to rewrite part of a testimonial, send it to the person who gave you the testimonial and get their permission to use it in that format. No permission and you can't use your revised version.

3) All customer testimonials need to be kept on file somewhere with their full contact information. If you are questioned about the validity of a testimonial, especially by the FTC, you'l need to provide the full contact info.

Hope that helps,

Mike

[ghyphena]

Thanks @ Martin, I don't consider it abrupt at all - just part of the discussion.

@ Mike - thanks for the pointers. I do conform to these standards when I post testimonials.

The question was really more from an abstract ethical point of view - not some dubious testimonial-related activity I myself am dabbling with - but rather where the moral line is when talking about things like customer testimonials/"professional testimonial giver" testimonials/JV testimonials/recycled testimonials, etc.

It seems that these four in particular are generally considered acceptable, especially in IM - I question how different they really are, in terms of how they may mislead the consumer, from a testimonial that's been fabricated. Obviously they're different from a legal point of view - I'm just saying that I don't think they're all that different from an ethical point of view, as the consumer isn't told about other vested interests that may exist surrounding the testimonial.

Any thoughts?

- Gil-Ad

[acedalright]

I'm not a huge fan of fake testimonials as I think they are just spamy scammy and not cool!

[Nathan Segal]

FWIW, I would only want to accept testimonials that are real, and only from people who have used the product. The fake stuff makes me cringe. I've been hearing a lot about fake reviews as of late, which reflects badly on those of us who don't engage in that practice.