Anyone sick of scrubs? We are.

I promote both CPA and lead gen type offers. I've noticed an increase in scrubbing over the last few months and I really think this is due to the fact we are in a down economy.

1. With lead gen offers they are having a harder time converting a sale thus making in seem like your quality has diminished. People don't have the excess money that they had a year or 2 ago.

2. With CPA offers especially biz opp the payouts to the publishers have gone up drastically over the last year but the rebill amount as also doubled. When a user is hit with over $100 for a rebill they are claiming that their card was stolen or that they didn't sign up for it. What argument do we have as publishers? You know the advertiser is going to be compliant with the user. I think users are ok with getting hit with a $59 rebill but when it gets over $100 in a down economy this is causing increase scrubbing.

Just my .02
 


xmcp123 said:
The offer that I'm referring to I can actually see the lead data.
They're not duplicate. They're not fraudulent.
The IPs tie to the given zip. They're not proxies. They wouldn't make it through my system if they did.

Defending merchants is pointless. They're steadily getting more shady, and the networks do fuck all about it and just tell us it's about lead quality.
It's not. It's about their margins.

If someone offers $42 on a free trial, the fact is that they are probably going to scrub everyone at some point. Regardless of quality.
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By duplicate it doesn't just mean that you are sending the same lead twice, rather it means that the lead you are sending may already be in the advertiser's DB and hence they are not going to pay twice for info they already have. Any big lead gen offer is going to scrub the data...if they're not doing that they'll go broke in days.

I am not defending merchants or advertisers, but I am trying to explain WHY they do what they do. Once you understand how they work and why they do things you can run your offers more effectively.

Free trial offers, depending on what they are promoting, are inherently prone to cancellations/refunds/chargebacks. Just as many AMs are tricking people into signing up for those offers, the advertisers are tricking AMs into promoting the offer by dangling big $35+ payouts. Of course what you are not told is that you don't get that $35+ payout unless the customer "sticks" and is successfully billed after the initial trial period.

hannahmcintyre said:
^^ Yup.

I'd rather take an offer that pays out $35 instead of $40 and doesn't scrub, giving a relatively consistent conversion rate than a scrubbing offer paying out $40 anyday.
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Yea, sometimes less is more. That is how I approach it...and ironically the lower EPC offers are much less competitive since none of the "big boys" want to touch them. Get steady pay and have lower promotion costs...sounds like win to me. :)

fatmoocow said:
You have two options. Continue promoting bullshit offers and deal with a constant array of assholes, or start offering real value to people by selling real products to people who actually want them. This is a lot of work and also the reason most people fail. If you do this then only 1/2 the people you deal with will be total assholes.
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This man speaks the truth.

smaxor said:
I invite everyone to do their homework into the advertiser they're promoting and really understand the companies they're working with. This goes back to my idea of trying to get as much information into affiliates hands as possible.

P.S. I'm not saying that they're not scrubbing. As that's another variable as well, just in the cases and numbers everyone is talking about it's not a likely one.
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Good post and it brings up a lot of good points. I wonder how many AMs just dive in and start promoting an offer based on EPC or payout without doing any kind of research on the company behind the offer. In fact, you can probably ascertain a fair amount of info just by visiting the offer's LP and looking at the copyright notice.

carolina3 said:
I promote both CPA and lead gen type offers. I've noticed an increase in scrubbing over the last few months and I really think this is due to the fact we are in a down economy.

1. With lead gen offers they are having a harder time converting a sale thus making in seem like your quality has diminished. People don't have the excess money that they had a year or 2 ago.

2. With CPA offers especially biz opp the payouts to the publishers have gone up drastically over the last year but the rebill amount as also doubled. When a user is hit with over $100 for a rebill they are claiming that their card was stolen or that they didn't sign up for it. What argument do we have as publishers? You know the advertiser is going to be compliant with the user. I think users are ok with getting hit with a $59 rebill but when it gets over $100 in a down economy this is causing increase scrubbing.

Just my .02
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Definitely...you can bet your ass that people are carefully monitoring their credit cards nowadays. When I see the rebill amounts ($2 to get a free trial, then $90 each month!?) I just think to myself who is going to let that slide with things as bad as they are now for a lot of people?

The model seems to be based on getting as many people signed up as possible and hoping X% of them don't cancel, do a chargeback or cancel the CC. So out of 100 trial signups maybe 50 of them back out in some way, 25 cancel/chargeback and 25 accept at least one rebill charge. It really depends and those numbers can fluctuate wildly for any number of reasons.
 
DoldGigga said:
By duplicate it doesn't just mean that you are sending the same lead twice, rather it means that the lead you are sending may already be in the advertiser's DB and hence they are not going to pay twice for info they already have. Any big lead gen offer is going to scrub the data...if they're not doing that they'll go broke in days.
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I'm aware. But I'm positive 2/3 of my leads are not in their DB.
I am not defending merchants or advertisers, but I am trying to explain WHY they do what they do. Once you understand how they work and why they do things you can run your offers more effectively.
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Ok I gotcha. I do understand why they do what they do to a certain extent. But the fact is that a lot of scrubs/shaves are not based on actual data. They're just the merchant getting greedy. Not in all cases, but in many.



On a side note, anyone interested in getting a thread together that's a running blacklist of merchants with unacceptable shaves&scrubs?
Obviously it'd be a bit tricky to confirm, but as long as people post some details it sounds workable to me.
 
Originally Posted by Smaxor
"B. The products are scams. I'm not sure why people think this but a lot of these products are very good with strong businesses behind them. The bigger advertisers in this space have 100's of employees, warehouses, etc."


So, Just because they have hundred of employees and a warehouse they can't be a scam? They can afford all that because most of them are ripping people off like wild.

Most of these offers are not very good. Acai doesn't cause weight loss, grants don't get you money, and most bizopps are trash.

So yes they probably have a strong business because their margins are very high because they are deceiving their customers by overcharging ridiculous amounts and making it hard to cancel.

And this is why we as affiliate marketers work with these companies because they have insane margines and we want a piece of that pie.
 
unfadable858 said:
So, Just because they have hundred of employees and a warehouse they can't be a scam? They can afford all that because most of them are ripping people off like wild.

Most of these offers are not very good. Acai doesn't cause weight loss, grants don't get you money, and most bizopps are trash.
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It's a catch-22 because AMs will not be interested in promoting a "good offer" that may only pay out $15 vs $30+ for a scam rebill. As a marketer it can be difficult to see things for what they really are when your vision is clouded by $$$$. So whatcha gonna do? Stick with the rebill scams and hope for the best or promote the better offers, which are often buried under mounds of crap, but at least you know that you will be getting paid each billing period.
 
I agree with Smaxor. The consistent "we're promoting scams everyday and none of these products work" attitude is not helping the industry. There are definitely rebill products that work. And if they don't, good merchants offer a reasonable return policy. He's also right that most affiliate underestimate the logistical and financial planning involved in merchant-side operations. (For that matter, many merchants probably do too).

Product-wise though, even with acai, while it's true that it's not the acai berries making people lose weight, the products DO typically contain a blend of at least green tea extract and caffeine that has been clinically proven again and again to help people lose weight. Don't you get it? Acai is just the marketing angle. The products contain more than just acai. They're not as useless as 99% of affiliates make them out to be.
 
Acai itself is actually legitimately good for you. I have acai berries a couple times a week. Resveratrol is also a legitimate product that probably does help extend your life.

Likewise a Google Kit actually introduced somebody to AM.

Sure, maybe flogs and rebills aren't the most ethical ways to promote things, but it's not like we are selling snake oil.
 
good idea, but...

"On a side note, anyone interested in getting a thread together that's a running blacklist of merchants with unacceptable shaves&scrubs?
Obviously it'd be a bit tricky to confirm, but as long as people post some details it sounds workable to me.[/QUOTE]"

Heres the catch to that idea Shady-
We would have to make it invite only, or protected in some way with only certain individuals able to exchange info. Why? Cuz MANY people here and elsewhere are going to throw a bullshit bread crumb trail to get people off their pots of gold. Ive already seen this many times here on WF. ALOT of disinformation. And not by mistake. Purposeful.
There are a few members here on WF that I know personally and trust, as well as a few networks, such as smax and ruck etc. Aside from that, who the F knows...I do know some networks and pubs that are outright scandalous. Its amazing to network with people and find out what goes on behind closed doors in this biz...
 
Heres the catch to that idea Shady-
We would have to make it invite only, or protected in some way with only certain individuals able to exchange info. Why? Cuz MANY people here and elsewhere are going to throw a bullshit bread crumb trail to get people off their pots of gold. Ive already seen this many times here on WF. ALOT of disinformation. And not by mistake. Purposeful.
There are a few members here on WF that I know personally and trust, as well as a few networks, such as smax and ruck etc. Aside from that, who the F knows...I do know some networks and pubs that are outright scandalous. Its amazing to network with people and find out what goes on behind closed doors in this biz...
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I think it'd have to be done with some detail. Story/screenshots/actual numbers. And perhaps a restriction on who can post there...Plus a certain amount of corroboration.
Of course there will still be fakes, but I'm not looking to make something bulletproof. Look at the information offered, and decide for yourself.
Or maybe have a 3rd party submit a lead to see if it tracks to confirm.

Also, I'd volunteer to do some merchant tracking. Find the company behind the offer, their other offers, etc.
 
xmcp123 said:
I'm aware. But I'm positive 2/3 of my leads are not in their DB.

Ok I gotcha. I do understand why they do what they do to a certain extent. But the fact is that a lot of scrubs/shaves are not based on actual data. They're just the merchant getting greedy. Not in all cases, but in many.



On a side note, anyone interested in getting a thread together that's a running blacklist of merchants with unacceptable shaves&scrubs?
Obviously it'd be a bit tricky to confirm, but as long as people post some details it sounds workable to me.
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DO IT.
 
Shady - good call and something I think has proper merits for publishers. If the nws are not going to take the lead on this its up to us, the affiliates, to be more proactive.

Dolddigga - your arguments suck major balls. It must be nice to live in your Mary Poppins fantasy land where everyone is nice and flogs do not yet exist.

Wake up.
 
Lets do it. And merchant tracking would be cool too. Advertiser contact would be really sweet. id love to chat with some of these "people".

Wow. Something useful came out of this thread.
 
unfadable858 said:
Originally Posted by Smaxor
"B. The products are scams. I'm not sure why people think this but a lot of these products are very good with strong businesses behind them. The bigger advertisers in this space have 100's of employees, warehouses, etc."


So, Just because they have hundred of employees and a warehouse they can't be a scam? They can afford all that because most of them are ripping people off like wild.

Most of these offers are not very good. Acai doesn't cause weight loss, grants don't get you money, and most bizopps are trash.

So yes they probably have a strong business because their margins are very high because they are deceiving their customers by overcharging ridiculous amounts and making it hard to cancel.

And this is why we as affiliate marketers work with these companies because they have insane margines and we want a piece of that pie.
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Is there bad products? Yes. Are their good products? Yes. My only point is the lame generalizations affiliates make. It's like an advertiser saying most affiliates are fly by night scammers just trying to rip off advertisers. Bullshit as well but a lot of them say that. Most affiliates are fraudsters and just trying to fuck us as advertisers. I've heard that a bunch of times as well.

If you want to say every advertiser is trying to rip people off you just lack understanding in my opinion. There is a lot of great advertisers and companies that back these products and services. There's shitty as well but don't lump everyone together.
 
tainted said:
The thread is a bad idea. You're starting a witch hunt.
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If it goes downhill, I'll kill it (or if Jon wants me to).

But Networks, though their hearts are generally in the right place, have proved unwilling or unable to police advertisers in any meaningful way.

So what else can we do?
The rules of the thread I started are pretty strict. Hopefully that can reign in the insanity. The fact is that we don't have the data/phone numbers to tell 100% if they're shaving leads. The networks DO have the data, and DO have the phone numbers, and do jack shit. I'm pissed off and tired of it.

Edit: You do have a point to an extent. I've unstickied the thread for now. Let's see how/if the content builds up. Then I may resticky
 
I agree that calling all of these products scams is downright stupid. Besides being untrue, it is industry suicide. This industry really needs some better public relations skills.

Acai was on oprah for a reason, and resveratrol too. They are legit products, and a continuity program for them is completely reasonable. It is convenient to the consumer to get a steady supply of something they take every day.

Any AM who calls acai a scam is as stupid and whiny as the dumb ass consumers who would rather cancel their credit card and complain to regulatory agencies than just call the company up and cancel the product.

If people call our products scams because they are expensive, well selling something at a higher price is not scam, it's good business, it's like calling starbucks and whole foods a scam.

It's either we weed out the truly unscrupulous companies that make it too dificult to cancel, and get better public relations or this industry will feel the wrath of government regulation in a way that will kill it in the next couple years.

We could learn a lot from the oil industry and their pr ads...

public relations FTW

I'm also sick of people acting like flogs (which are advertisements) are somehow incredibly deceptive. When I turn on the tv I see commercials where people eat a candy bar and act like they just got injected with heroin/cocaine speedball of euphoria, and CGI sharks do flips after drinking lemonade.

It's advertising, and it's not unethical.
 
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