Say "No" To Moneyback Guarantee??

by sahi

Posted: 15 years ago 30 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

I think the regular moneyback guarantees that we see, and give in our sales letter are detrimental to our businesses online because such guarantees open the doors to people who take an advantage of it and abuse it, and go on refund sprees as we have already seen here on warrior forum and in IM niche as a whole.

If you are selling CDs etc that need to be shipped then make sure the person asking for refund should mail you back the whole package as it is, and in case of digital products like ebooks etc, we should stop giving moneyback guarantees. As a result no chance for anyone to abuse the goodwill of you selling the product.

I propose the following type of Guarantee instead of the regular moneyback guarantee.

"

No Guarantee

I have been in internet marketing for a very a long time now. What I have found is that the people who buy this system on a lark or just to see what I have in it are either ripoffs, or don't have much chance of success anyway.

I only want to deal with people who are deadly serious about learning how to make good use of my [insert product name here] in order to make their lives better or improve their knowledge. Sure, I don't mind if you just want to dabble in internet marketing, but I'm not going to give you my hard earned knowledge so you can steal it and then ask for a refund when you come up a little short for Christmas money.

I'm also not going to spend time with you on the email or phone, or skype etc trying to help you. I know the value of my time. I'm sorry, but I'm not giving up my time for free and you won't want to give your hard earned knowledge away either when I teach you what I'm going to teach you in my product[insert product name here].

The value you will be receiving in this [insert product name here]comes from the knowledge from the books, audio tapes, video tapes and CD's. It's just like in the magic industry. You absolutely can't return magic tricks, videos, props, etc. because once you know the trick you got the value.

I will be glad to certify that every single thing written in the sales letter above is in the [insert product name here]. If you buy the [insert product name here]and challenge me on the above statement, I'll be glad to take the time to point out where the item is.

If I show you something that you're challenging, you agree to pay me for my time. How's that? Is that fair?

But guess what. I don't want to do that. I want you to study and apply the techniques and get the success your deserve if you work at it.

Here are two notes I got in the same week from a two different persons who bought the same [insert product name here]you are buying (along with my thoughts about what they wrote):

First Note
"Your name here, I'm returning the system because I didn't realize it was this involved to earn online."
Name withheld to protect the moronic

My thoughts: YOU DIDN'T REALIZE IT WAS THIS INVOLVED??? Well where was your mind when I wrote at least 10 times in my sales letter "this is a lot of work and no get rich quick scheme?" Were you just BSing me when YOU said "Yes, absolutely I'm willing to do all the work and whatever it takes to become a successful internet marketer and earn good money online."

[You can put as many notes here as you like based on the actual refund reasons that you get when you are asked to refund the money by someone who bought your product]

Second Note
"Your name here, Just wanted to let you know that how much was your system/product/method/ebook/course etc. really helpedme. I acted upon your instructions/method etc, and got the results that you talked about, and now I'm .....................
Your Customer

My thoughts: This is the kind of person who is going to be really, really successful.She used the information to get ideas and then put them into play.Her words tell you the results. . . .

Which type of person are you? If you are a "note one" person, don't buy because I'm not giving your money back and you can use the product as a door stop . . . pretty expensive door stop wouldn't you say?

If you are like the "note two" person, order immediately and let's get moving making you a successful marketer.
I will kill myself to try to help you reach your goals.

Your Name here

The original Guarantee was written by Tom Antion in his sales letter selling the professional speaker course. I just changed it a bit but not fully to just give an example of a NEW kind of Guarantee---No Moneyback Guarantee.

So shall we stop giving moneyback guarantees or shall we continue to play in the hands of refund lovers??:confused:

#guarantee #moneyback

winebuddy

15 years ago

I would be very interested to see what that does to your conversion rate. Good Luck.

Personally, I think your rate will drop. And really, isn't that all that counts?

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TonyDavis

15 years ago

Originally Posted by winebuddy

I would be very interested to see what that does to your conversion rate. Good Luck.

Personally, I think your rate will drop. And really, isn't that all that counts?

Are you only losing the dead-beats who won't use your product anyway? Are you only losing those who are likely to ask for a refund? I'd be interested to see the refund rate of a website that doesn't offer a money-back guarantee....

TD

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Okane 15 years ago

People won't buy unless they feel "secure".

A money-back guarantee is a great tool to give them the "feeling" of security.
In many cases, this will be the trigger to click the buy button.

But as always... it's not important what I think or what you think.

Just TEST it.... and the results will tell you which way to go.

Marc
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vhargis 15 years ago

I like the idea of refunds ( I dont like giving them) but I the opportunity to win some one over with great customer service.

That being said I would love to see the results of anyone does a split test on this.

money-back guarantees are a way to build trust

my2cents
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- kimkitch 15 years ago
  
  I think that the guarantee is a safety net for purchasers and that a majority of people will buy the product and never use the refund option. Yes you will get people who want freebies and always take the refund option but i am sure that you will make more money in the long run if you leave the guarantee in place.
  
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Adam Carn 15 years ago

I like what you've written but I'm not sure if it will be as good as a money back guarantee in terms of conversions. Yes there are people who are serial refunders or the ones who just like to take advantage of the guarantee but those people relatively lesser than the genuine buyers so overall you won't lose out.

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Adam
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vhargis 15 years ago

On an off topic note (or maybe not so off topic....

"You can get anything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want."

Is a goal we should all strive for. Thanks Okane for the reminder.

v
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Jason_V

15 years ago

I never understand why people get so wound up over two particular issues that surface here on an almost daily basis:

Refunds

Piracy

The fact of the matter is a refund policy is going to help the honest customer buy. Sometimes people have legitimate reasons for wanting a refund. By not providing a refund I think ultimately you're only going to hurt yourself.

If you look at pretty much every major copywriter they explicitly tell you that you should include some sort of money back guarantee in your sales letter.

It's up to you if you want to fight a one man revolution when it comes to refunds. By doing so you'll be going against the grain of tried and true practices that have resulted in billions and billions of dollars of sales. Not theory, this has been proven time and time again by seasoned copywriters who know what works and what doesn't.

This does have to do with piracy as well. If people want your stuff bad enough they're going to find a way to get it. It's just a cost of doing business. Sure you can try all kinds of tactics and techniques to keep them at bay.

However, just like above by not providing a money back guarantee, you're only alienating your honest customers. Those who don't get it through piracy would probably buy it and ask for a refund anyway. So, who cares if they pirated it because they would have probably wound up having it for free either way.

To be brutally blunt most people don't even use what they buy. Do you really believe that someone who gets something for free is going to use it anymore than someone who actually buys it? I guarantee you the odds of this are very slim.

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Tina Golden

15 years ago

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Jason_V

15 years ago

Originally Posted by TMG Enterprises

Not giving a guarantee means diddly squat anyway. The people who want a refund will simply do a chargeback and you're screwed anyway so what are you really accomplishing?

Tina

Thanks Tina for this reminder, this reminded me of something else I wanted to mention in my above post.

If you don't offer a refund you're going to have people pulling the "unauthorized purchase" through PayPal game. Or, if they use a credit card they'll do as Tina said a charge back. If you have enough of these happening, you may get your PayPal account temporarily or even permanently shut down.

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Ross Bowring 15 years ago

Refunds are just a necessary evil of doing business.

Because... you often don't get the business in the first place unless you dull or eliminate risk with a guarantee.

That said, certain products align themselves to being able to pull off the "no guarantee" angle. I've seen it work. But only in the hands of a capable copywriter.
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Killer Joe

15 years ago

"Who Else Wants to Say Good-Bye to Guarantees and Say Hello to Chargebacks?"

There's your headline...

You can pretty much kiss Clickbank good-bye while you're at it, as well.

Here's the deal...if you're not getting refunds, you're not marketing aggressively enough. You're basically trading the growth of your business for a sense of security.

If you can look in the mirror and tell yourself that you're happy with 30% of the sales you could be getting because it eliminates you having to worry about the 3% - 5% of folks who will request a refund then tell yourself this as well...

"You suck as a marketer!"

You can try as hard as you want to create products that you believe are so good only a fool or a thief would ask for a refund, but the truth is you are only fooling yourself. And if you create an artificial barrier to sales, such as a "Once you buy it, you're stuck with it policy" then you are stealing from yourself, as well.

You have no control over the 'perspective' the customer is coming from. They might be ahead of the curve relative to your product, or they could be so far behind your product looks like rocket science to them. Basically, your product might not be a good fit with them.

The only true times you would ever need to be worried about refunds or piracy for a digital product is if the customer base suddenly stopped growing, or you've run out of ideas for new products.

As long as they keep making babies, your potential customer pool will increase. And as long as you keep an open mind, your ability to see new opportunities to create or sell products will allow you to prosper.

Or you can take your football and go home. The choice is yours.

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Steven Wagenheim

15 years ago

I'll bet every dime in my bank account that if you go to a no guarantee
policy, not only will your conversions fall through the floor, but the people
who really want their money back will get it...in spades my friend.

Welcome to the land of the chargeback...it ain't pretty.

Not only that, kiss Clickbank goodbye and kiss affiliates goodbye. Nobody
is going to promote a product that doesn't convert.

Good luck...you're going to need it.

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Kay King

15 years ago

From an article in the NY Times:

thought merchants were required by law tomake refunds at the customer's request. They aren't. Stores are permitted to set their own refund and exchange policies. By law,they are required only to notify consumers about those policies before they make any purchases.

Read more: Refund rights

That applied to offline products but with online products, as Steven mentioned, many consumers have discovered the "charge back". Never mind that they often must lie in order to get a chargeback - money is money, right?

I think the tone of the "sales page" is antagonistic and self focused overall. If you want to have a "no refund" policy and are selling through your own accounts (rather than clickbank or other platform that requires such a policy) - then do it and see what happens.

It may work - may not.

A better alternative might be to simply mention "no refunds" without the defensive text - and make exceptions if needed. Another way to do it is to simply not mention refunds at all.

Some sellers spend so much space on their sales page talking about their great refund policy it almost seems to invite people to refund. The text can end up being "buy because you can get your money back" instead of "buy and use this great product".

kay

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sahi

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

I don't consider clickbank as something that I can't live without so it doesn't worry me at all.

The main point is that who will test this NO MB Guarantee thing in IM niche, you, me or some other brave warrior, after all we are called "warriors" aren't we, and warriors should keep true to the sense and meaning of the word.

And it is not necessary that you should bet all the dimes in your bank account just because you want to test this thing out, because this betting stuff can lead to the bankruptcy in some situations.

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jdrohn74

15 years ago

I'm not a lawyer but as I understand it, you are legally required to refund someone's money for 30 days after purchase regardless of your guarantee.

As I see it, you might as well tell them that and remove any doubt they have about buying your product!

But as other have already said, split test it and see what works. Numbers don't lie.

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DogScout

15 years ago

Originally Posted by NathanFalkner

Yes, this is accurate. In fact, just last week I went
to see a movie with a friend of mine. The move was
not really as good as the trailer made it seem. So
we politely went to the ticket booth after the movie
ended and requested a refund.

After collecting our refund, we stopped at the local
gas station to fill up our gas tanks. Knowing that the
law was on my side, I promptly requested a refund
after filling my gas tank. My friend requested a refund,
too. It was very simple to do.

Thanks for highlighting this important law that far too
many people don't even know exits.

Safeway used to have a policy that if there were more than 3 in line in front of you, they would open a new line or pay for your grocreies up to $25. I went to Safeway every night. inevitably there would be 4-5 people in line. I would tell the cashier that and the manager would look out his little window and scowl.

After paying, I and the one or two people in front of me would go to the manager's little window and get our $25. I fed my family for a year doing that nightly until they stopped the guarantee. The manager was such an ass, he would have someone available to open another register and could avoid paying me $25, but he never would. I was never sure if he was helping me or just so miserable, he didn't care.

I suppose, looking back, I was being a jerk as well. It was almost a game. There were even times I'd lurk around the front until 4 or 5 people were in line. (If we didn't need any food, I'd go buy $25 worth of lobsters for dinner.)

The first night I went there after the guarantee was over, he yelled out his little widow: "No more soup for you!"
Lol

(Then I went to Wegman's

)

(Just you don't think I was a complete ass, it was not unusual for me to pay for the person in front of me when their credit card would be denied *which was a far more common event than one would think* IF the groceries were mostly diapers and baby food and not beer. Yes, it was a poor part of town across the street from where I worked.)

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tj 15 years ago

Say "No" to a money back gurantee and you say "Yes" to charge backs and charge back fees.

Timo
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freddy smith 15 years ago

if they success, no need to ask refund, success people have much money than product price
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dv8 15 years ago

Although I agree with you, I think that if the product does what the sales letter said it would, then getting a refund is out of the question.

But, it doesn't work that way.

The whole point of the guarantee is to take risk away from your buyer. You seem to be forgetting that everyone is always thinking "what's in it for me?" Your buyer doesn't care about YOUR viewpoint on guarantees. They care about THEIR viewpoint on guarantees. And the fact is, THEY want YOU to shoulder the risk. Hence offering a guarantee.

But, feel free to prove us all wrong and test it. That is the ONLY true way to figure out if it will work or not.
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freudianslip27 15 years ago

I think that for people just starting out, they absolutely need to have the guarantee. It's lame, believe me I hate it when I feel like someone just ripped me off.

The times I've myself went for a refund, was when I actually tried the system or product, and it didn't work as claimed. I provided a detailed explanation and received the refund no problem. I don't have a problem at all if that happens to me either. It helps me understand why my products may not have been a good fit for someone.

My gut feeling is that conversions would drop if you killed the guarantee, but I think it does depend on your market.

For example, I've seen some people offering no refunds and stating it upfront, and it makes me feel like the information is even more valuable. Wow, if you have to pay JUST to get the info, it must really really be good. The seller cannot afford to refund you because whether or not you do the system, you've just read it, and that can't be undone.

Matt
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Loren Woirhaye 15 years ago

Jim Straw (one of the giants of mail order) is skeptical
of the value of the guarantee, and on his info-products
doesn't offer one.

Making a big deal out of why you are offering no guarantee
might be worse than not offering one, though.
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Slin 15 years ago

I rarely have problems with returns.

If you know your product works, why be afraid of offering a refund?r
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sahi 15 years ago

I have applied the "No Guarantee" in my two non-IM niches online, and stated clearly in my refund policy that there won't be any refunds of any kind, and no moneyback guarantee of any kind.

Law also requires "the buyer to be aware" and as such the payment processors can also be notified about the explicitly about the policy that you are having on your website.

My payment processor is 2CO, and when I ran two different offers in two different niches online for ten days and 15 days respectively, in total 1487 people bought the digital products in first niche and 678 people bought the 2nd set of products in 2nd niche, and to this day, not a single customer asked for refund or did charge back.

What this shows?? Most of you can say that either my products were of high quality or people belonging to those niches were not "educated" properly about the refund and chargebacks and they didn't know about these two concepts.:rolleyes:

One thing that I've noticed and observed is that refund and chargebacks are part of the IM game and outside IM niche that's not a problem, so if you don't offer MB Guarantee then you won't have any serious problems.

Correct me if I'm wrong but no one here in IM or in warrior forum (except me) has tested this thing outside in any niche, so what most of you are saying that floodgates of chargebacks will open on me if I offered no MB Guarantee, are just saying it based on no experience at all or any real testing done by them. So it's all assumptions based upon your experience of IM niche.

So in my humble:p opinion MB Guarantee is only part of IM niche online, and I don't think any one will be brave enough here to test this thing out here in the IM niche.

I would say that Moneyback guarantee is also a myth just like the double optin list building myth, and the real situation will come out when someone, either me or someone else tests this out in open.
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George Wright

15 years ago

I've purchsed a couple of "high end" (For WSOs) WSOs that plainly stated "Be sure you want this. No refunds period.

Seemed to work for the Warriors. Of course charge backs and paypal disputes make it iffy at best.

George Wright

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sahi

15 years ago

Originally Posted by George Wright

Well this shows that there are some people out there who offered NO MB Guarantee and did well with it.

Also another thing to consider is the reputation of someone selling something without the MB Guarantee because if you can trust him then not having any MB Guarantee will work. So solid reputation counts if you want to offer No MB in IM niche, and sadly not many can say that they have solid reputation in IM niche. Almost all of us have some skeletons in the cupboards.

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Greg guitar

15 years ago

Originally Posted by sahi

Actually, he said he bought the products and that the policy "Seemed to work for the Warriors." This doesn't show they did well. For all we know from the post there could have been 3 total sales. They may have done well, but "seemed to work" is hardly evidence.

I do agree about reputation though. There are many Warriors I'd be comfortable buying from without the guarantee. That said, I'm still more likely to buy with it; it just plain makes me feel more comfortable.

I have spent an embarrassing amount on untold quantities of IM products from many different marketers, and only once have I asked for a refund. But, even though I wasn't going to use it, the risk reversal helped sell me on many of them.

If I were interested in your product and saw that whole rant, I would immediately say "forget it", even though I probably wasn't going to take up your time or get a refund anyway. It sounds so combative; bordering on embittered, that it made me wonder if you were joking.

Do you really think it's a good idea to express suspicion that the reader is going to be a "ripoff" or "steal" from you, in first two paragraphs of this lengthy diatribe? To me that's outright hostility. So is the example of the lazy buyer who asks for a refund when they discover how much work is involved, followed by the scolding, where you practically call them a moron.

Maybe the buyer was a moron, but the state you want your potential buyer in is one of excitement, anticipating the wonderful benefits they're about to get. I hardly think you ranting about your worst customer is going to do that, even though it's followed by a positive example. The fact is, you just put the prospect in the defensive posture.

It sounds like you just needed to get some frustration off your chest and I hope for your sake that you accomplished that here, so you don't continue to vent when writing your sales letter.

Try it if you like, but I think you'd be shooting yourself in the foot. I very much agree with dv8 that the focus should be on the buyer, not on you and how valuable your time is, etc. I care about what your product is going to do for me, not about your customer service headaches, so speak to what I care about if you want my business.

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Marian

15 years ago

Originally Posted by George Wright

In case of some WSOs I quite understand that. Also sometimes you won't have a chance to control what somebody does or doesn't with the product (like PLR stuff)...

But in general I'd offer the guarantee - especially when dealing with digital products.

Marian

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natscash 15 years ago

If someone pays by credit card and is not happy with your products, they can always go to their bank and file a chargeback. It will look better on your end if you freely give the refund then having multiple chargebacks on your account. You may lose your merchant account that way or if you're using paypal they can still freeze your account.
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Say "No" To Moneyback Guarantee??

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