Let's say we put the responsibility for buying products on the one place where it really belongs....the buyer.

Transferring the responsibility and the liability to the classified advertiser is not only a waste of time, it's insane on many levels.

Who's going to verify the data submitted for verification?

Where does the process end?

~Bill

I didn't know ClickBank is going to verify people's claims now. Is this posted somewhere? Link?

Just watch what happens with Clickbank.

This isn't going to work. It's a load of BS. Clickbank is just trying to put a policy in place. They're not actually going to stop or investigate anything.

Here's an alternative idea, one that's been suggested a number of times already: How about a blanket ban on all income claims in WSOs? Or at the very least, the stupid, easily-faked screenshots.

Clickbank and any marketer that is full of crap with their income claims is playing with FIRE.

The FTC is cracking down on these snake oil salesmen all the time now.

I think it's a good thing, we can finally get rid of the false income claims that people use to sell everything.

Are you really freaking serious? Let's see ....
Mods buy or get it free and them implement the method, no matter how long that takes.
If they make money ... it's all good.
If they don't it's all bad.

If they do make money because they implemented, then Joe Schmuckaroo who doesn't implement will accuse mods of telling little lies.

Oh ... and mods do have a life ... somewhat. And they aren't paid to be mods.

How about this? Buyer do their own due diligence and take responsibility for purchasing decisions that they make.

Buyers stop expecting the Internet to hire a babysitter for them.

If buyer does not believe the income claim ... don't buy. Now there's an idea.

LOL so if the buyer believed the fake, ridiculous claims it's THEIR fault for being stupid?

How are they to know who is honest and who is full of it? They're constantly blasted with fake stats all day long.

So there's no issue with the fake crap, but there is the inference that the purchaser is just stupid for believing it.

That's whack.

I have personally purchased many WSO, mostly to find new business models or ways of driving traffic.
I see people all the time saying "Nothing in the WSO section works!" and they cry and complain.

The truth is, most (if not all) of the business models or traffic generation products in the WSO section do work. The problem is that people are lazy and think that some magic is going to happen that fills their bank by simply purchasing a digital book.

Clickbank can't verify crap unless it goes directly through their site. Many marketers these days use server software to run their businesses, and only use Clickbank to pull in the sales of Affiliate marketers.

Lets use an example...

X = Website program that drives traffic to the website it was installed to.
Q = Is an Internet Marketer that uses X on his blog.

Q sets up a blog for his favored Niche (Doesnt matter, dont ask). He sets up his On-Site SEO, Installs X on his blog, Writes Articles to publish on a regular basis, pings each post, creates backlinks to increase Search Engine Ranks, and even posts an Article on a few high end directories for an extra boost.

Q makes a bunch of sales, and decides to promote X because he made so much money. He creates a new website to promote X, and shows his stats from Analytics and his Affiliate sites.

So how can Clickbank verify this? They would have to find traffic that didn't come from Search Engines, Article Syndication, Pings, Backlinks, and even Word of Mouth. Can we even prove if X drove any traffic to the site? Honestly, it would take a LOT of work, and you would have to split test by doing absolutely no promotion other than using X.

I agree with this. I would bet that many of the screenshots in WSOs are inflated at least a little.. using 'inspect element' in Chrome or firebug in Firefox, it takes literally seconds to change those numbers around. I never put income screenshots in my stuff because my real earnings can't compete with other peoples' fake earnings, and I refuse to participate in the lies.

I have a better idea and one that's a lot easier to implement.

How about you just take any income claims with a grain of salt. That's what I do.

See, the thing is even if the seller IS making the money claimed that does not mean that you will. And I'm going to venture a guess that most of the systems or methods to make money take a heck of a lot of work so it's up to the buyer to do the work, choose the right keywords, get the hard to get backlinks etc...

As stated above, use your common sense with these things and buy accordingly. There is no magic easy button.

Lee

NOBODY can do that, not even Clickbank! SURE, clickbank can check the PAYMENTS THEY have made, but WHO on the planet traacks all payments? NOBODY! And INCOME is worse, because WHO tracks all expenses? NOBODY! HECK, I once received a check for $250. How much did I make? TRICK QUESTION! I LOST $4750. The payment was on a $5000 theft. SURE, the FBI knew about that. Apparently nobody else did. EVEN the IRS(You know, the MASSIVE organization to find this out for US taxpayers) requires W2s, 1099s, etc... to try to approach INCOME. STILL, they require US taxpayers to double check, appeal for refunds, and possibly submit to audit. SIMPLY because NOBODY TRACKS IT!

BTW misrepresenting clickbank statements COULD be considered LIBEL, FRAUD, and copyright infringment, not to mention violating TOS.

BTW if it ever were tracked, HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of people could be OUT OF WORK! Auditors, IRS people, accountants, some investigators, lawyers, etc... I don't know how ANYONE could track it though. You would have to get rid of any bearer bond type stuff(the most popular US version is the US dollar). You would also have to mandate central control of any commodity. You would ALSO need to have ONE pipeline where both parties are identified. In the US, the first may be 80% done, the second maybe 30%, and the 3rd is done maybe 30%. SOME companies, through the ACH, and definitely through credit cards, comply nearly 100%, but that is it. And the IRS doesn't even bother wading through ANY of that stuff unless you are audited. The IRS just has investment firms, banks, and employers, send them summaries. Still, that is GROSS INCOME ONLY!

Steve

Ankur,

You're heart's in the right place and in theory, this sounds like one of those ideas that SEEMS like a good idea, but when you take a closer look at it, from a legal standpoint, all the way to how to actually handle it logistically, it's a nightmare.

Clickbank might have a policy in place, but actually implementing and enforcing it is a whole different animal. I just don't see that happening.

The simpliest answer on why the mods can't "authenticate wso's income claims" is that it just isn't logistically possible. You'd be asking the volunteer moderators to put insanely long hours and in the end, no one would be able to agree on the criteria and how far to take it.

Clearly, in business transactions between the buyer and the seller both parties should be conducting their business ethically and morally, but that doesn't always happen. There are some really GREAT WSOs out there since I happen to own many of them, but there are also some real SHADY ones and it's our duty as members to report those.

If you've been here long enough you'll notice that there are people that create WSOs soley to earn income from them and/or build a list, make their money, and get the hell out of here. I always buy WSOs with my credit card that has purchase protection on it, so if I ever need a refund I can get it irregardless if it's a service or a product. Buying through Paypal doesn't always give me that option so I no longer use that when buying most of the WSOs. I've been buying WSOs for over 7 years and I've only asked for a refund a couple of times because I research the seller and I ask other users what their experience has been with the product and I contact the product creater to see if they are responsive.

It's really important for the buyer to bear some responsibility as well. Many folks just buy on impulse or with very little research. I think with some common sense and more thorough research you could drastically cut down on many of these issues.

Lastly, I would love to see any and all income claims banned. Why? Because it's going to force some people to write better sales copy, which is a skill they should be working on anyway. Look, instead of writing:

How To Earn 15,397.39 Per Month Using The Profit Hurricane Mega Blaster 2.0

You can write something like:

How I Quit My Job Last Month Using The Profit Hurricane Mega Blaster 2.0

Not my best sales copy, but you catch my drift. You can always allude to making money without having to use actual numbers. There are probably 1,001 ways to do it.

RoD "Coffee-Rules!" CorteZ

I couldn't even read the entire thread before I had to respond to this, so if this has been addressed, I apologize.

Ankur... YOU are a Mod... We all are... http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...moderator.html and http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...moderator.html

That aside, how would you propose we do this? In order to submit a WSO, there is a requirement to fax in a certified copy of bank statements? Even if we did that, it would only verify the amounts received, and possibly the source (clickbank, paypal, etc) It wouldn't verify HOW that money was earned.

I could send money to my paypal account several times a day from other peoples accounts, or worse yet, send money from one bank account on my paypal account to paypal, then have it daily dropping back to another bank account. (If you have 2 checking accounts on a single paypal account, the bank statement side would be easy enough without even creating fake statements. Since the transfer between a bank account and a paypal account costs nothing.

To provide even reasonable authentication of earnings statements, would put such an overhead into the WSO system, that the people reviewing would need to get paid, the review would take several days, and it would become impossible a number of warriors to even meet the requirements to submit a legitimate WSO.

Clickbank only has the ability to verify claims about clickbank earnings, and even that is going to run into problems.

Since the Warrior Forum doesn't process the orders, touch the money, or in any other way have anything to do with the transaction except being the marketplace where the advertisement appears, there's little that anyone at the Warrior Forum could do.

Does every television station, newspaper, website, billboard advertising company or radio station require full disclosure of all these details in order to run an advertisement for someone who wants to lend money, sell an item, hire an employee, etc?

Generally (can't speak for every outlet, but really) the answer is typically NO.

But let's not try to put the burden on the Mods. What access do you or I as a Moderator of this forum have with regards to Warrios ABCDEFG's business? We have NONE.

How much information would we have to request and sift through on EVERY WSO?

I believe it would require, VERY CONSERVATIVELY, at least 15 minutes on every WSO, just to open the submitted information, verify everything was submitted, and verify that in all cases 1+1 = 2. When you consider you'd have to have someone looking for shady practices, cross referencing different sheets of submitted data, and the fact that there would still be no way short of acces st o the seller's accounts (bank, paypal, website, clickbank, etc) to be even reasonably certain some people didn't submit false documents to start with... There's very little added protection.

Do you want to have to pay $400 to submit your WSO?

here's my new WSO.

100% verified income, how I make over $600 a week without a list, without a website, and withouta search engine!

(After customer purchases) I got a regular job! that pays about $34,000 per year.

There, nuff said.

Doesn't matter who says income claims are "authenticated", I don't trust income or traffic claims unless I know the person. There is WAY too much crap out there and many scammers. It does make it easier for us good guys though.

You know what there is one very interesting thing about this thread. Almost most of the people, who are posting here are seniors. Most of them got thousands of posts. I see no newbie posting here. But if you just visit any wso, you will see warriors having 10-12 posts and buying wsos. Countless times, i have seen warriors saying "I have question on your wso. I cant pm, because i got less than 50 posts".

Everybody is clearing their system. Plus, this is not a common marketplace.

I am not claiming. I got the solution for this. But there has to be some way. Look at apple, look at their restrictions to list apple application on their system.Its extremely strict. Steve jobs did this for a reason. He know if he need to keep things clean, he has to make rules and regulations stricter. Plus, the whole approval thing has to be more brutal.

But, the way newbies keep getting sucked in by magic bullets, its disheartening. I know some of them may grow out of this. But, i am sure many will fail so much, that they will loose all hope in IM field.

[DELETED]

I hate to beak it to you buddy but even Clickbank cannot verify income claims, they are too easily botched, no matter the angle it is presented. Also, keep in mind that income claims are generally exceptional results and in no means offer an income guarantee. Seals are usually bought so they mean nothing. Buyer beware!

If you NEED something, you'll buy it regardless of the potential income it may bring. Most WSO sellers do offer some sort of money back guarantee so if it comes down to it and you're not satisfied with your purchase, just contact them and request a refund. Same applies with Clickbank... No questions asked money back guarantee.

PS: I'm not a newbie although I have less than 10 posts.... I have no idea where my last account went to and can't retrieve password since the email I signed up with got deleted by accident.

I happen to believe there is very little "garbage" in the WSO area.

Lots of copied/altered stuff yeah ...but it still works...its still good information....you have to engage in actual action and persistence.

What you say? ...yeah you actually have to do some work and use your brain.

Too many people want to ckick a button and have stuff done for them so they don't have to actually talk to people, or negotiate, or reveal themselves behind the big curtain.

The big money comes from actual work...actual setting up processes and putting them into motion and following through when there is a hiccup or bump in the road....apply that forumla to any WSO, and that WSO will work.

Income claims should just be banned alltogether...I think it would force people to become better marketers of their own products without getting to rely on that overly influential income claim.....its like a big crutch....an easy button.

I have little doubt someone made the income...its just hard to say if all of it came from the product at hand. (shrug) I saw somehting John Durham did recently ...He put up his WSO pro account income numbers and then made a public challenge that if he was lying, Mr. Lantz could ban him from the forum ...to me that would solidify a claim...if more people did that i think the credibility of claims would strengthen greatly.

These are valuable points Ankur Sharma
No one tells WSO is bad,It contains tons of useful information but the information publishing way needs to be changed.
"income claims made in wso section has almost reached at epic nonsense level. You see a guy asking a question "How can i make money" and next week you see him posting wso Here's how i made $1ok in 1 month"
and
So, i guess may be if newbie wants to learn Im. First, he has to learn "The magic bullet" doesn't exist and he has to learn it in hard way

Each and every member First learn 600$ in one week because(6000+ hours already worked in past by that member.)So you need to work atleast 3000+ hours to get your first sale online.

No Magic Bullet Learn it in hard way to stablilize your income,Learn more stuffs.

Simple math: Removing income claims = less WSO purchases = less happy WSO sellers = less WSO bumps

I've seen some outright deceitful stuff in the WSO forum, clearly meant to trick people that don't know what exactly they're looking at. It's not even just income claims, either.

I agree that income screenshots and claims should just not be allowed. You can literally create a fake screenshot in less than 10 seconds, and there's absolutely no way to tell if it's real or not. The income claims you see are all trying to outdo each other to the point where you might as well claim that you make "1 quadrillion dollars," because it's just as believable. The sad part is that it's easy to be fooled by fake or misleading screenshots and income claims if you're not technically inclined and understand how easy it is to pull this off.

It's quite sickening, actually. It's this kind of scammy stuff that makes me hesitant to tell people that I make an income online. I'm not going to say everything in the WSO forum is garbage (the one $$ WSO I've seen was actually excellent, and the creator is rightfully doing very well with it), but it's comparable to sifting for gold nuggets in 50 tons of dirt.

An earnings claim is completely independent of whether or not something works.

Just because I made $xxxx.xx doing A-Z, at 00:00:00 time on 00/00/000 date, in country, state, province, city, town, hamlet, classified site, forum, blog, search engine, while Jupiter was in Venus and the stars in the heavens aligned while Haley's comet passed over on a full moon..... doesn't mean you can duplicate that because many of these factors cannot be easily replicated, sometimes not at all

There are just too many factors at work here to base any products effectiveness on someone else's past results with it anyway.

They just make good stories, and it's unfortunate that we need and FTC to protect people from their own stupidity who want that kind of story, but then want to call in Big Brother when they can't replicate the results because they were too bloody ignorant to have figured out that there will always been unknown factors of that which could never be duplicated. There's enough regulation of Big Brother protecting me from me. I certainly wouldn't want in here.

But the fact is people buy the story, and verifying whether or not I got the results I claim I got, will still never guarantee that you will do the same. That's just the IM version of the 'gated community.' A false sense of security.

-Dani

There are only so many moderators on here. If they had to go
through each sales page trying to verify everything, then there
wouldn't be much of a WSO section because there wouldn't be
very many new offers.

People whom plan on doing business unethically will soon find themselves
banned from the forum. It's just like there aren't enough police officers able
to catch everything illegal violation.

Think about it.

My thoughts on this are pretty clear...

Income proof has nothing to do with the level of success I might or might not have with a method. The seller might make $100 a day with his/her method. I might buy the WSO and make $0 a day or I might buy it and make $500 a day. In the end it falls on my shoulders to make the system work.

The sad part is I have written free reports giving away my exact strategies for making money online and yet very few people who gain access to those reports do anything with them. The reason people get upset over WSO's is the same reason they get upset with most IM products...they want a push button answer to a problem that has no push button answers.

Just my humble two cents,

James

Why is that anyone thinks we have to protect people who fail to use their own common sense?

There are already rules in place about using fake screenshots - if you can show that one is fake, report it.

There are already rules about being scammy or deceptive - if you can show an offer that is, report it.

But if you think you can protect newbies from all the bad guys, you're sadly mistaken. And I don't even think you should. How are we doing them a service by trying to do their thinking for them?

One would assume that the majority of the newbies coming in here have a reasonable amount of intelligence, unless they're out there in the offline world falling for every television commercial there is. No one is going around offline and holding their hand, is there?

How are they going to learn to discern the difference between the good people to follow and the ones they shouldn't listen to?

How did YOU learn to tell the difference? I know I learned by experience and my gut feeling tells me that's the only way to truly learn discernment.

Ankur, this is a marketplace, not a place that babysits buyers and "verifies" that all offers are legitimate and above board. Do you know how much time and expense would have to go into making something like this happen? Even if it's feasible (which I don't think it is), you'd probably have to pay a hefty monthly fee just for these services to be performed on every WSO.

You definitely wouldn't be getting $7 WSOs anymore, and then you'd have something else to complain about. Look at any marketplace out there. Consider ebay - scammers and con artists hang out there all the time. Ebay can only do a certain amount of due diligence on sellers, and the rest is up to you.

If even one of the biggest and most well-known online marketplaces can't do what it is that you're proposing, what makes you think that this forum can do so?

Grow up, and learn to think for yourself. If you come across some crazy offer that guarantees you can make $100,000 within 7 days with a $50 investment and you buy it, you only have yourself to blame.

Paul

I had comments to offer, which I refrianed from posting, because when *I* read what I had to say, it seemed like I was inviting a war. Which I was not.

The OP asked that Moderators 'verify' the claims of a WSO, and I think I put it fairly clearly before that WE ARE ALL supposed to be moderators; and that in day to day business, how many of us ask everyone involved in our face to face transaction about their qualifications to make this procut or to make this sale to us?

I asked in OT the other day about why some people thing they are worth what appear to be outrageous amounts when offering zero support for their prices... And you know, I had people asking if I provided 5 different proofs that I was a legitimate business, rather than addressing my wuestion about why people thought they were worth what I perceived to be high (but not necessarily outrageous if supported) values for a service with ZERO evidence...

But aren't we all supposoed to be moderators here?
ASSUMING every WSO poster provided 100% accurate information, how long would it take in person hours for 4-10"moderators" to verify everything submitted on a WSO adds up?

How many Warriors would want to submit complete business financials to make a WSO?
How many warriors would be content to accept the 6 hour to 6 day turnaround time between their payment and the actual go live of their WSO for their submission to be 'verified"?
How many people would cook up a passable set of books?
Unless we gave the "moderators" i.e. EVERY MEMBER full access to every WSO offerer's accounts (bank account, clickbank account, paypal account, hosting accounts, etc) how could a moderator be confident they had accurate information?
If mods had to look at each offer, woudn't the need arise to PAY moderators, thus increasing the cost of the WSO?

I was more eloquent before, but I didn't want to seem I was trying to start a fight. But seriously, after a few more hours the dispute was still the same, so my points, I THINK, still stand.

Simple.

Just stay away from WSOs that don't require the basic things like:

no seo
no ppc
no sb
no promotion
no programming
no email list

...because this WSO means nothing....

Yeah...

Why don't you just hand over your bank account info, your paypal login info, your clickbank account info, your affiliate accounts, etc. etc...

You go ahead and do that... me... I prefer to keep my money in my accounts.

Due Dilligence + Research = Good Buys AND/OR Money Saved

Let's go with your idea. I can see the scenario now:

• Allen hires full time staff to do nothing but test WSO's.
• Full time staffers, being paid to do it, follow WSO's to the letter.
• Full time staffers make a crapload of money following WSO's to the letter.
• Full time staff immediately quits, cuz Allen's not paying them close to what they're now making on the WSO's.
• Allen discontinues verification program.

The end.

Actually... when I say there are no legitimate income claims that's
a bit of hyperbole. The FTC does publish guidelines for making
income claims but following them renders most claims ineffective
anyway.

Tsnyder

Yikes. Ankur, it is up to the buyer to check the previous posts and the reputation of the buyer. It's not hard to do.

Claims don't count as much as the quality and logic of the WSO that is being offered. And, of course, there must be a full money back guarantee.

Paul

Its a semi good idea, however it is a WSO. No one is loosing there shirt or going broke because they bought a certain product that was trash. Plus we have many honest reviews on the products themselves, we are entrepreneurs, we have to be prepared for investments that show no returns, lessons learned you know?

Ricardo