Unethical Marketing Tips [ Continually Updated ]

[CCarter]

"I wanted to save the world. Saving the world, as it turns out, is very hard, you know?
Long hours, bad pay, and perhaps the world does not want to be saved.
Inside all of us, there are packs of wolves, some flocks of sheep roaming through our thoughts.
We want to be fair, and yet, we want to win.
We want to be righteous, but we want to get ahead.
Such is our struggle.
Uh, at some point, you decide it might just be easier to save yourself." - The Laundromat​

--

Let's get serious, we're here for the money, and marketing is about getting customers to pull out their wallets. So just in time for the holidays, the marketer's Super Bowl, let's talk about some marketing strategies, tactics, and tips that get customers to pull out their wallets and clients to sign on the dotted line.

​

--

1. Fear - Either fear of missing out (FOMO) or overall fear that they'll get clobbered when their competitors over take them. Fear they are gaining weight, aren't pretty. Everyone has insecurities, all business have weaknesses. Figuring the insecurities of people within the industry, niche, or topic you are targeting is the #1 way of being able to exploit that fear.

FOMO can be "limited-time offer" or "only 50 customers will be able to get this special product, after that we are closing the doors." Fear can be pressured or hit an exploit you find.

Exploit vulnerability and any negative emotions you can get hints of from buyers. This is literally how the whole diet/health industry operates out of. Enough of these games. Realistically if a person want's to lose weight tell them to fast for 24 hours to 7 days and they'll see so much weight fall off they'll be flabbergasted. It's not rocket surgery - reduce the input of calories, increase the output energy = weight loss. However no one makes money off that formula, except the water company (cause you still have to drink water daily).

So the whole industry creates a ton of bullshit guides and hoops to jump through. Magic potions, pills, or weird exercising machines.

or

Some of ya'll product creators are playing too many games LOL.

2. Discounts - This one is blatant in the SEO and online software world. With the online marketer crowd they seem to "want a discount", so any seller worth their salt knows to just make it look like there is a discount. So if you want to sell your product or service at $59, you just say it's $89, and for a limited-time there is a 33% discount.

Or you just have the "coupon" code entry available within the shopping platform so they go google it or ask you for a "coupon" and you give them one that takes $30 off. Use this knowledge to your advantage. If you see a "coupon code" for something you want hit up customer service and ask for it - fuck it.

3. Women As Sex Symbols - I like women, I like looking at women. If you have an attractive woman next to your product it implies I might get a woman like that by using your product. That's life! Get with the program kids. Sex sells and has been selling since the dawn of time.

If you don't like it, tough shit, if you want to make more money however, get a hot chick next to your product, as a spokesperson, or model, and press play on that record button.

​

4. Competition Comparison - Talk as much shit about your competition as possible. They are the enemy! "It's either us or them!" You don't have to do it directly you can use traffic leaking tactics to get "3rd party" individuals to start the commotion.

I see this within the Amazon reviews of products, mostly from China. Weird one-liners like "this micro-needler had blood in it, it was obviously used". I got suspicious when every product I looked into had similar complaints. God-damn competitors. But you don't even have to go that far, just create comparisons of your product or services against competitors is enough. If you've got an affiliate program give the content to your affiliates and let them rank for you and your competitor's brands in the "brand versus brand" google searches that happen.

5. Fake or "purchased" testimonials or reviews. This is wildly popular on the internet. I always see these testimonials from a "Karen from Nebraska" - really Karen... An ethical way might be to link back to the Yelp page or the place the reviewer reviewed at, but realistically that never happens.

Take it further step and put images of "reviewers" right next to the review. People love seeing people. But where do you get images without potentially running into trouble in the future? Try ThisPersonDoesNotExist.com - keep reloading the page and take screenshots. Good luck!

6. Don't target poor people. Basically target people with money. How? Find the median zip/postal code of places and only target postal codes of people that have above a certain income level. Example Miami's Fisher Island - you can't even get their by road, you need to ferry your ass across, keeps the peasants out. It's got it's own zip code, so it's the wealthiest zip code in the USA - Zip Code is 33109.

Within Facebook and Google and other paid platforms you can target specifically by zip codes, so you know anyone coming from that zip code that lands on your paid campaign is going to have money or access to money. It's not wealthier by a little either - it's by A LOT:

7. Keep Raising the Price. This one isn't really unethical, it should be common business practice. "Keep raising the price until they say no!" - GaryVee

The thing about it is, is it can backfire. For example Godaddy raised their prices 20% in 2018. You might have missed it if you have a ton of domains that auto-renew. Tricky bastards huh... However they did it again in 2019! They raised the price another 20%! I didn't realize it until I looked another auto-renew and saw a .com now costs $17.99, LOLWTF? Used to be $9.99, and these clowns sold their company and now the new company is exploiting people that haven't bailed to NameCheap.com, which still has $9.99 for .com pricing with free WHOIS protection.

I started moving all my leftover domains to NameCheap, but damn, they were slick for a while at Godaddy. They got me several times. They probably got you too! Half of ya'll are going to check your recent domain renewals right now.

8. Exaggerate Claims. If you go overboard you'll get called out and it'll hurt your brand in the long term and maybe in the short term. But if you are in for a quick buck, make false claims, exaggerate, and keep doing it without caring.

"Did we happen to mention we are in this for the money?" - The Laundromat​

9. Screw up the ability for consumers to compare. This is one retailers do, they give products in weird sizes which do not allow consumers to price compare products. Therefore they are left to compare quality, the brand, and other aspects of the product. I heard this one on the radio today, ZipLoc has a package that's only 19 plastic bags in it (ZipLoc Freezer Bags, Quart, 19 ct). This is done on purpose so you consumers can't quickly compare another brand's bags with theirs cause consumers can't do math in their heads easily.

10. Steal. Plagiarize products, services, or ideas. Just take the idea, market it better, and get the bread. That's literally how China has become a Super Power in the last two decades. You think the Chinese give a fuck about your Intellectual Property rights?

--

Just a quick note - A LOT, actually almost all, of these tactics can backfire and get you into some trouble. But if you are a ninja traffic leaker you can dance around a lot of this.

Also - I didn't create this environment. I'm not in ZipLoc's marketing meetings. The USA is consumer nation, all they want to do is consume, they have been groomed since birth to consume, they have no way of not consuming. They'll go into credit card debt to consume. I didn't create this environment. But I'm not going to apologize for it either. Fuck it.

​

"If they are buying it you should be selling it." - CCarter​

--

I'll be updating this list as I think of more angles to exploit.

 

[TheWeeb]

Another one would be creating games targeting kids and offer various power ups / shortcuts as in-app purchases so they (unknowingly) use their parents money. I don’t really know if it still works or if Google and Apple has already implemented some kind of preventative measures.

 

[DanielS]

Another one would be creating games targeting kids and offer various power ups / shortcuts as in-app purchases so they (unknowingly) use their parents money. I don’t really know if it still works or if Google and Apple has already implemented some kind of preventative measures.

Here's something that companies such as EA have started doing in recent years- make the "grind" so unbearable and time-consuming that consumers are essentially forced to take out their wallets.

Have you ever played a sports video game? FIFA, NHL, Madden, etc. EA has made it so you either turn playing the game into your part-time job (so you can accumulate in-game currency) OR you take out your wallet and just purchase items, bypassing the purposely manufactured grind.

It's like when you watch a YouTube video showing you "how to make money online without a website" and the video creator is constantly saying how "having a website is better overall and my affiliate link for hosting is in the description, but you can use a free Wix website and have a garbage website if you want..." during the entire video.

 

[Boy]

Once I get my cold email system set up & have a solid team of prospectors, I'm going to make a fake LinkedIn profile of a young white woman and use that to build out my network. Can set up automatic sharing of articles & posts from my service to "her" network and grow that way. I imagine most companies will be more willing to pull out their wallet for a nice young woman than a scary black man hahahah

 

[CCarter]

New. Gamification - Turning things into a video game like experience. Uber is doing that with perks where when you ride more you save more. Same with credit card points, or even GrubHub where when you order more you get points and are encouraged to keep ordering more. A great book about this is Hooked

 

[CCarter]

New. Holidays / Religious Events. Turning holidays, religious moments, or tragedies into opportunities to sell products. Example a tragedy where a young driver kills themselves after driving recklessly, selling candles, teddy bears to family and friends for vigils. Any opportunity for people to get together a marketer can make money at some level. Is it strange that I see the world as just cash registers?

Holidays and religious events are great for this too. Use the holiday as an excuse has been a staple for vacation destination points, restaurants, and shopping malls, and almost every eCommerce store and retailer in existence. We're going into the Holidays folks, if you can't make money as a marketer during the next 90 days, you suck and need a new career. The shoppers are literally lining up to give money to ANYONE who pitches them something remotely decent.

"In the end there are no real needs except the wants we marketers get consumers to desire" - CCarter​

Like do you really need 10 more inches on your TV? Probably not...

 

[Poplanu]

Turning holidays, religious moments, or tragedies into opportunities to sell products.

Selling flags, patriotic trinkets, and shirts after 9/11 comes to mind. A lot of money was made by those who jumped on the opportunity. America...

 

[CCarter]

New. Using Deep pyschology of social issues. This one is more than "color pyschology" we are talking about the deep state of people's identity. First take a look at this video:

--

Now here is a situation where if you understand the root cause and you are a marketer you realize a couple of things. A lot of "unemployed" people aren't really unemployed but UNDER-employed or still have access to money at some point. So you can still sell shit to them.

What do people like do to when their own reality is shitty? Escape the reality - escape to the movie theater for 2-3 hours, escape by watching TV - hence binge watching Game of Thrones AGAIN, or escape to play video games. Since we are average marketers with average resources we probably aren't going to make a movie or TV series anytime soon, but video games - well the barrier to entry had been reduced.

But forget making a video game, you can sell accessories or be an affiliate because all those unemployed people still do SOMETHING to occupy their time.

Looking at social trends you see a growing population of video gamers that are over 25 and 30 years old. Again remember these people have to occupy their time with something, so boom, if you can target unemployed men over the age of 30 - you're in the money.

 

[Rowling]

Simply brilliant, as always.

Unemployed over 40 suffers a mix of desperation and self-defeat (and depression) that provides the perfect mental state to sell them almost everything employ-related. I mean, something that looks employ-related that in fact will be something to scape from their shitty reality, something that will give them the illusion of being doing something to change their lives, to get a job, to earn money...

Sell them some hope in easy-success disguise and they will buy it like hot bread.

Let me explain it.

Desperation prevents you from thinking clearly, so they won't think if what you are selling can help them or not. They simply will believe it. Their self-talk is about how defeat they are and sometimes they repeat to themselves some positive-talking only for surviving purpose. But most of their self-talk is negative.

They need to fix their lives, but they don't know how. Or, when they know how-to, they don't think they are capable of. Remember: desperation and self-defeat.

They need to shut up their inner voice. They need to recover the illusion of control their lives. It's a survival mechanism.

Don't think about selling them some cheap stuff. Desperation is powerful. They will do whatever it takes to stop feeling it. Even ask for a loan that they can't payback. Expensive stuff is the key. And logical fallacies your best ally. Your selling speech must be full of them.

The biggest promise. Make them think big. Tons of money. Expensive clothes. Golden watches. A luxury car. Holidays in paradise. A house in an exclusive neighborhood. Forget minor stuff as pay debts.

Repetition. If I can, you can. Repeat them this mantra until they believe it blindly.

Identification. Tell them you were in the same situation (or worse) than them. You were unemployed and hopeless too, but now you are happy and successful. So you are the best (and the only one) to help them.

Drama. Eviction and children are what work best. Choose one of them. You almost lost your home. Your children were sad because you couldn't buy them presents at Christmas. (The best one I have read was one about a marketer that had his epiphany moment when he went to the doctor for some vaccines for his children and he had no money to buy them... in a country with free healthcare were vaccines are FREE. Glorious.)

Easy peasy. Low barriers. I mean low intellectual barriers to enter (money isn't a problem because loans exist). It's so easy that a monkey could do it. (Remember: If I can you can).

Almost effortless. Their self-esteem is so low that they won't believe they can put a big effort.

Fast results. It will be an event, not a process. They must believe they will go from rags to riches in a hurry.

Examples. Show them how many people changed their lives following your advice. Don't dwell on the details.

Make them busy. They must think they are doing something profitable (more profitable than just filling your pockets). Most people confuse being busy with achieving results.

YOU GOT IT.​

Don't worry.

Most of them won't follow your instructions but will be happy being busy for a while.

And the ones that follow them and won't get results will be a blessing to you.

And do you know why? Because if they haven't got it is their fault responsability. Because they didn't follow your instructions to the t.

You can sell them a coaching session.

You can become their mentor.

Happy selling!​

Take care of yourself. Nobody will.

 

[CCarter]

New. Enhanced Visuals. I almost forgot about these videos - great visuals:

Model: Juliana A. Morgan (http://julianaamorgan.com/reel)

--

Model: Ellen Canton (https://www.lacasting.com/ellencanton)

--

What's clever about this is if you look up each model, they don't look like their appearance within the videos. Some Tomfoolery going on in the editing and wardrobe departments...

 

[cobblepot]

i don't get it, they gave them bigger boobs?

 

[Boy]

i don't get it, they gave them bigger boobs?

 

[CCarter]

I'm going to flip this one on Seth: Attention vs. the chasm

New. Center Of Attention. In any industry, group, social setting - there are always power sources. You can "generate" your own power by leeching off another more powerful source to enhance your own.

What does that mean?

Take Round-Ups - where bloggers get industry experts to answer a series of questions about a specific topic to get different perspectives. What's really happening is a little-known source (startup blogger) is ego tripping people within an industry that are at the "top of their game", and therefore validating that source's own existence within the industry.

Online Geniuses does it.

Anyone coming up can do the same thing.

They are leeching off the attention and audience of one individual or multiple. Round-ups have the better potential to case a wider net, but they aren't ego stroking the person to the point where they would go out of their way to send their audience to the person seeking to leech.

But an AMA does.

Also a guestpost can.

Also podcast definitely WILL.

Once you have the person who's ego you want to stroke as a "master of an industry/topic" - make them the center of attention and they will in turn send tweets, FB shares, and spread the word about their presence on YOUR website/channel to THEIR audience.

After awhile you've accumulated enough brand recognition/power so people come to you looking for attention and exposure.

Also don't forget your brand will be ranking for their name

If you can create the center of power - as GaryVee calls it "Host The Party" - you now have a platform to spread your propaganda throughout the industry. It's why people still quote very bad SEO news sites that are always wrong and never teach anything real, cause they are only real source of news.

Basically leveraging like a seesaw as you climb the chaos ladder.

--

An analogy is a new kid coming to a new school. Has zero power and no contacts.

If this kid can someone ego trip a couple of the "cool kids", like literally host a party at his house and invite them, then eventually that new kid will be seen as a "cool kid".

The longer route is to prove your own self-worth and have people gravitate towards you by providing value or entertainment.

If you can do both - you are golden.

 

[Philip J. Fry]

I'm going to flip this one on Seth: Attention vs. the chasm

New. Center Of Attention. In any industry, group, social setting - there are always power sources. You can "generate" your own power by leeching off another more powerful source to enhance your own.

What does that mean?

Take Round-Ups - where bloggers get industry experts to answer a series of questions about a specific topic to get different perspectives. What's really happening is a little-known source (startup blogger) is ego tripping people within an industry that are at the "top of their game", and therefore validating that source's own existence within the industry.

Online Geniuses does it.

Anyone coming up can do the same thing.

They are leeching off the attention and audience of one individual or multiple. Round-ups have the better potential to case a wider net, but they aren't ego stroking the person to the point where they would go out of their way to send their audience to the person seeking to leech.

But an AMA does.

Also a guestpost can.

Also podcast definitely WILL.

Once you have the person who's ego you want to stroke as a "master of an industry/topic" - make them the center of attention and they will in turn send tweets, FB shares, and spread the word about their presence on YOUR website/channel to THEIR audience.

After awhile you've accumulated enough brand recognition/power so people come to you looking for attention and exposure.

Also don't forget your brand will be ranking for their name

If you can create the center of power - as GaryVee calls it "Host The Party" - you now have a platform to spread your propaganda throughout the industry. It's why people still quote very bad SEO news sites that are always wrong and never teach anything real, cause they are only real source of news.

Basically leveraging like a seesaw as you climb the chaos ladder.

--

An analogy is a new kid coming to a new school. Has zero power and no contacts.

If this kid can someone ego trip a couple of the "cool kids", like literally host a party at his house and invite them, then eventually that new kid will be seen as a "cool kid".

The longer route is to prove your own self-worth and have people gravitate towards you by providing value or entertainment.

If you can do both - you are golden.

That's a good idea, CCarter. However, Seth Godin's blog post was talking about something else. It looks like you took his blog post, added some creativity, and got a new idea. Good job. Your post is about having perceived authority transferred to someone else, by means of "leeching off" someone who has more authority. I think this was covered in Robert Cialdini's Influence in more detail; but, that's not what Seth's blog post was about.

Here's what Seth Godin's blog post says, for all who's interested.

His post was prompted by the Tesla Truck controversy. Elon Musk stated that the window was unbreakable; but, in the PR demo, the window broke. In the marketing community, people questioned if that was a PR stunt or just an actual failure. Within this discussion, some people argued all attention is good attention and that attention is innovation. Godin disagrees. He presents his argument in the blog post.

He begins by stating how, back in an earlier time, any innovation would result in attention. This was back in the 90's, where any new technology would be covered by publications such as Wired. This would get the innovators exposure to early adopters, who were searching for new things. The early adopters were the company's first consumers. However, the early adopters are not the mass market. Godin then takes an idea from Geoff Moore in his work Crossing the Chasm. In this book, Moore argues that somewhere between the the first adopter and the first 12% of the market is where a product turns from a niche, innovative product and a mainstream product. The early adopters want what's new. The rest of the market, want what's proven, reliable, trustworthy, and socially accepted. Those two segments are different. This serves as the basis for the rest of Godin's argument.

His argument is that consumers want a brand that they trust and know, in addition to one that received attention. The attention is needed since that is how the consumer is exposed to the brand. However, they don't want to feel abandoned by a brand, which happens when a brand receives their attention but then fails to live up to its promise. In the reading, Godin mentioned this sense of abandonment. He was an early Apple user, when it was a niche tech product. After Apple switched to become a mainstream, luxury good product, Godin felt abandoned by Apple. He understands that it was part of Tim Cook's plan to make Apple mainstream and states that the mainstream consumer wants something that's trustworthy instead of something that's just new.

He then argues that companies should not seek attention just for attention itself, which can result in lost of trust if the consumer feels abandoned afterwards; but, instead, should innovate in a way that is honest to their brand and consumer base. He says "But instead, in this new age in which attention is a substitute for useful innovation, they burned that trust by seeking attention instead. The thing is, innovation has long-term benefits for all of us. The craven search for attention at all costs does not."

He then goes on to use the example of Art. "Musicians have figured this out–every new song has to push the envelope, has to somehow make things better and be new enough to matter–but at the same time, they can’t burn the trust of audience they’ve earned to date."

So, what Godin is advocating that marketers do is to stay innovative, for the attention, but innovate in a way that's within what the consumer's perception of the brand. The doubts he gave, that he thinks consumers have when evaluating a new brand, are: "Can I trust this brand? Can I trust this product to keep its promises? Can I trust my social circle to applaud my choice?" In the reading, this was quoted for the mainstream consumer but it can be said of the early adopters too. With early adopters, the brand just needs to stay true to its brand, which is innovation. For the mainstream audience, the brand needs to stay true to its brand, which is whatever image it created for itself.

Therefore, what Godin is arguing for is that innovation does lend itself to attention but not all attention is good. If a company is innovating for attention, it risks losing the trust its consumers had in its brand, which would cause it to lose those consumers. Therefore, companies should innovate in a way that's true to its brand.

Now, what happens when the brand is just a person and there is no product or service? How does a person stay true to his or her brand, while also staying true to himself or herself, without losing the trust and confidence people have in him or her? Well, I think this comes down to the difference between a persona and character. A person's brand is their persona. It's their public image. A person's character is who they are when they're alone or with close, intimate friends. There's a difference. Modern society places an emphasis on personas and less on character. I think, at the surface, people are used to persona; but, what they're looking for (and what will keep their attention and loyalty) is character.

The same can be said for brands. They want brands that know their character. It's OK if the brand had a slip in persona here and there, as long as it stays true to its character. Sure, Coca-Cola came out with New Coke and it alienated some of it's fans; but, it quickly learned and reverted to its true self. The opposite can be said for McDonalds when it added McCafe. Did people get offended that McDonalds, a fast food hamburger restaurant, added coffee? No. Did it lose trust in it's brand? No. McDonalds still provided the tried and true burgers but it also added a different option in the same fast, reliable service.

Now, how does a brand figure out its true character? Well, it's somewhere between what the marketer's of the brand believe its brand's character is and what the consumers of the brand believe it is. Our self-image is made up of our own self-image as well as the image others have of us. Same can be said for brands.

Anyways, good post CCarter

 

[CCarter]

Trap Card Activated.

New. Leech. An example of leeching is when you cannot come up with content yourself yet or have no platform to spread your own propaganda. You can attempt to siphon off of the content of others within your industry. The goal here is to comment on authority figures in a controversial way or in a way that "adds value" and attempt to associate "authority" with the individual or brand by leeching off of the authority.

Users can do this by using Google Alerts, Mentions, or SERPWoo Monitoring type of services and follow a company or individual around and add your two cents to the conversation where you see that company/brand/individual participating.

You actually have to add value otherwise the community start suspecting ulterior motives if you only follow one person around and only comment within their content.

You eventually have to create your own content and show you can stand on your own two feet, otherwise people won't take you seriously. Now if you can mimic or what Dan Pena calls "model" off the person you admire you can eventually start embodying some of their characteristics.

Eventually you have to create your own identity for your brand or personality.

An example is if I follow Nick Eubanks around on twitter and just reply on everything he comments and replies on. But I do it in a way where I can create comparisons or doubt in people's mind, making it seem like we are opposite forces in a duality led realm.

Even if I get 1 of Nick's followers out of 100 that saw the conversation to look into following that's success. But IF I don't come up with good enough content to keep up with Nick the user will eventually un-follow me and all the energy would be wasted.

If you employ this type of scenario you have to make sure your game is on-par if not better than the target you are attempting to leech off of, otherwise it will backfire.

The difference between this method and "Center of Attention" is Leech is a direct or indirect confrontation to stir the pot. It's "intellectual trolling" and can, if done right, eventually wear down your target and get them to go silence if they are weak. BUT if they've got power - it might backfire or you might activate a trap card.

Eubanks is a great guy by the way, I know some people cannot comprehend the word "Example".

 

[CCarter]

Part of 5. Fake or "purchased" testimonials or reviews., here is in action in the wild:

--

Fancy pants is using JavaScript/jQuery to create a randomized number every 5 seconds so it looks like it's a live update. It is less scaled down than the VeriPurchase Alternative script I created.

 

[Mahjong]

Hiding the x (close button) on popup window and "Confirm shaming".

Amazon "confirm shaming" when a Amazon prime membership cancellation take three steps to confirm:

 

[CCarter]

New. Take Credit For Free Images. Browsing Reddit I came across this gem:

I know that the standard advice is "don't bother trying to fight blackhat links, Google will catch up to them" but in this case, I'm not so sure Google could ever find/penalize these links.

The tactic a competitor is using - reverse image searches a photo in the public domain (government source) or from Pixabay, and blasts out emails to those domains asking for their website to be attributed as the source. For all I know they aren't even claiming to own the photo, just saying "hey I see you're using this image, could you link to my site as attribution?"

This site has gotten over 250 linking domains in 2020, over 60 above DR50 including really high-quality websites that would never link to them otherwise.

The site is ranking well and continuing to rank better every month. The images are niche-relevant so the linking domains are typically niche-relevant as well. This is the only linkbuilding tactic they're using.

[... The rest of the reddit post is a bunch of horseshit to waste their time to try and stop the genius. Basically an SEO literally wasting their own time...]

Sauce: Blackhat Link Building Tactic
​

--

Whoever is employing this technique is fucking brilliant. I wish I could shake their hand and buy them a steak dinner. You have to admire the creativity, just wow. It's refreshing to see people still in the trenches employing the darker arts.

 

[ToffeeLa]

Whoever is employing this technique is fucking brilliant. I wish I could shake their hand and buy them a steak dinner. You have to admire the creativity, just wow. It's refreshing to see people still in the trenches employing the darker arts.

Think that might have been 'lifted' from Craig Campbell, who has a more in-depth view on it (work out what different news organisations use when the source of a photo is not known, search their sites for such photos and send mildly disturbing letter from legal-looking source to newsdesk asking for credit).

(about 15:00 in)

Added: I think he even had a fake solicitor (law) website set up as a source for the mails but was advised by friends that he might get in a lot of trouble for impersonating an officer of the court (or something). Obviously as he says he wasn't the only one using this technique - I think I heard the NFG guys mention it at one point.

 

[lion1978]

Added: I think he even had a fake solicitor (law) website set up as a source for the mails but was advised by friends that he might get in a lot of trouble for impersonating an officer of the court (or something). Obviously as he says he wasn't the only one using this technique - I think I heard the NFG guys mention it at one point.

HE could potentially get into a lot of trouble, but it all depends on how it's set up, if forinstance you set up a website called BuSo Law (dot) something, and write an email using a fake name stateing that you are writing on behalf of your client and yadyadayada.
Then in the signature write whatever fakename title: Partner or Senior advisor.

He'd be in the clear because notwhere does he claim to be a solicitor/lawyer and if the website is set up right then nowhere on that site does it say that they are a Law firm or that they employ solicitors.

He'd be simply be relying on human psycology and clever tactics that when you recive an email from a "company"/website that has law in the name of it, and the person writes that they are contacting you on behalf of their client, you'd automaticly assume that it's a Solicitor/lawyer and abide by their whishes to avoid going to court.
You could call the phenomenon percieved authority.
Why does it work, because very rarely will anyone go through great lengths to discover that there is no law firm behind it and that noone claims to be a lawyer nor does the website claim that it's a law firm.

In regards to the signature, which could be seen as a dead give away, it is not on the contrary actually, using the title partner, indicates to the recipient that it's a prioritzied matter for the fake law firm and that their client must therefore be an important one, since it's a partner in the fake law firm that writes the mail.

And also remember that most people and companies, even larger coorperations are willing to go a long way to avoid potential prosecution.

 

[CCarter]

when you recive an email from a "company"/website that has law in the name of it

You know what's so absurd about the whole thing? Attorneys don't send emails to make threat on behalf of their clients. They send real letter, in the snail mail with signature requirements to make sure you got the "Fuck you with strong letter to follow" mail.

If one has never been sued or threatened they wouldn't realize this. Anyone sending an email is not serious. The main reason is there is no way to know whether the person got the email, it's the right person getting the email, it didn't go to junk, and so on.

I'm not talking about communication back and forth between attorney/counsel on a matter, I'm talking about the intitial reach out to threaten/strongly demand something on behalf of a client.

So if you guys get "email" from attorneys, especially shit like getty - it's just hot air that's designed to scare you into submission based off of your own ignorance of how the system works.

 

[lion1978]

You know what's so absurd about the whole thing? Attorneys don't send emails to make threat on behalf of their clients. They send real letter, in the snail mail with signature requirements to make sure you got the "Fuck you with strong letter to follow" mail.

Yep I know, let's just say it may have happened once or twice to me

the thing is most people don't know it, because they stay miles away from the line between right and wrong. because they are afraid of potential reprecussions.
Personally I often dance on that line.

 

[nothing]

perhaps the world does not want to be saved.

This is my experience. The majority of people (who act like losers) want socialism, so they say. But they don't really want socialism. They don't want everyone to have the same amount. They really want those who have worked harder and smarter and therefore who have more than them to have nothing like everyone else. Socialism is the ultimate race to the bottom. Which is ironic because Socialism leads to Communism where everyone has nothing except the 0.1% who get everything. So it leads to an even bigger delta between the people and the "elite". I think most people know they are losers in comparison so they want everyone to be a loser because then they are "normal" and it shifts their responsibility.

When I originally started out my own thing all my "friends" encouraged it. Wished me luck etc. When I started making it, I was the problem. The enemy. The oppressor. The patriarchy. You name it, if it was bad, it was I. I remember thinking; "why did you wish me luck then?" It's because they thought I would fail. Well I did fail, later on. But I just get back up every time. One of them who was very high on his high horse still works his £14k a year job LOL. So I moved away and now I don't have a clue, nor a care what they are doing.

Honestly I think, and there's a certain line you don't cross; ethics are for losers. It's very easy to justify not doing something "because ethics" than just saying "I'm too scared of failure to try".

 

[CCarter]

very easy to justify not doing something

People are scared to take the leap to do anything because they fear people/friends/society making fun of them when they fail. Similar to your experience they expected you to fail, and when you did they came around to say "see you belong right here in the mud with us - rising is not for us."

"It's easy to give up. You can come up with all sorts of excuses on why you should quit, excuses to protect your ego. A reason to procrastinate just like you've done all your life." - Dan Peña​

The best excuses are the self-righteous ones, Dan talks about it here:

"I see it on the Youtube all the time: 'well if I have to be ruthless I don't want to be rich'. Thank you. Fortunately for you guys people would rather be poor than not be ruthless." - Dan Peña​

At the end of the day making more money means you're able to give more opportunities to yourself, your family, your kids, even your true friends that otherwise would not be there. But takes guts, it takes balls to go out an start a business and face the market. But you still have to try, cause on your death bed you'll be complaining about the regrets you have on the things you didn't do, you didn't try, you didn't go after.

"The framework I found, which made the decision incredibly easy, was what I called — which only a nerd would call — a 'regret minimization framework.'

So I wanted to project myself forward to age 80 and say, 'Okay, now I’m looking back on my life. I want to have minimized the number of regrets I have.

I knew that when I was 80 I was not going to regret having tried this. I was not going to regret trying to participate in this thing called the Internet that I thought was going to be a really big deal.

I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not ever having tried.

I knew that that would haunt me every day, and so, when I thought about it that way it was an incredibly easy decision.'" - Jeff Bezos​

In the end @nothing when you are fail you are failing forward and upward. When you do fail you find yourself at a higher plane than when you started, and you just have to keep going and keep going. That's it. Leave the peasants behind, let them wallow in their mud.

 

[lion1978]

Not sure if you'd categorise this as unethical, I suppose it depends on your definiton of ethical, but the idea is fairly simple, you go to facebook search for your keywword/keywords sort the results to groups, then open the groups and go to their members section, members are listed by newest members first then click on each individual member and message them about your site/product/social media pages or groups, ofcourse there is the risk of getting slaped acros the wrists for "spamming" however if you construct your message carefully it shouldn't be a problem after all they have already shown an interesst in the topic.