February 3

Refunds, Everyone’s Talking About Them (part 1)

5  comments

After several conversations with clients and others, I decided
that I needed to address the topic of refunds. I’d like to hit
on a few areas that apply to sellers and re-sellers….

In part 1, I’d like to talk to re-sellers/affiliates. This should help
you vet who you promote for in the future.

Despite what you’ve been told, or what you hear, REFUND
RATES ARE NOT GOING UP
! Yes the economy is bad,
yes people are harder to sell to, yes getting a refund is easier
then ever before…but rates are NOT GOING UP*.

Now you probably saw the little * on my statement above…

Let me clear that up:

Rates are not going up on GOOD PRODUCTS w/GOOD MARKETING PRACTICES

Here are two real life examples from current clients:

TradingConceptsInc.com: OptionsMD Product LESS THEN 2% REFUND RATE

RockwellTrading.com: The Ultimate Day Trading System LESS THEN 8% REFUND RATE

Here’s what’s happening, ready to have your mind blown??…

People are getting smarter!

?Companies are promising their customers the moon, and when 99%
of customers can’t achieve those results, they bail.

Customers now,more then ever, are being promised the moon
with guarantee’s that simply cannot be achieved by 99% of
your customer base…therefore they’re bailing!

Ask yourself this; “Of the previous promotions I’ve pushed
where the marketing was right on the edge, how many refunds
came through?” You might get sick when you actually see the number.

Customers still buy the hyped stuff, but refund a LOT more as
(SHOCKINGLY) the claims aren’t able to be replicated…

Which ultimatly HURTS and reflects VERY badly on YOU!

The above refund rates are not just with my clients (although those
rates are SUPER low). The key is quality products, high value, and
honesty up front. It could be argued that money is being left on the
table by not pushing that limit harder…but what about sales down
the road to a customer that’s already bought?!

====================================================

Second point I’d like to make regarding refunds…

ACCESSIBLE EXPERTS!

OptionsMD is run by Doc Severson who’s almost annoyingly??? involved
in customer support that begins as soon as a customer purchases. With
the automation of almost everything now-a-days, that old fashioned ability
to talk to the expert REALLY sticks in people’s minds.

We’re relaunching OptionsMD starting Feb 21st and to prepare to BEAT
our 2% refund rate, we’ve actually had Doc clear his personal schedule
and we tried to talk him into sending his wife on vacation so he would
be able to be READY for all customer issues and questions. It’s that extra
step that keeps customers on board when they buy the course.
(are you an affiliate or want to check it out? Visit here and email me)

You hopefully know Markus Heitkoetter by now, but if not you’ll
quickly learn that as the name/face/mind behind his product he
prides himself on being readily available to customers AND his
support staff.

Rockwelltrading.com has a highly trained team that understands
refunds happen, but that they also can be AVOIDED with good customer
service and having experts able to answer any and all questions. We had
an affiliate push our ebook offer this past month, and there were several
very personal questions that were sent to the affiliate, that were then
forwarded to us…

MARKUS ANSWERED THEM ALL!

I’m talking about 20min+ per email for someone that TOOK A FREE OFFER!
Who does that???

Someone with less then 8% refunds, that’s who.

====================================================

So how do YOU as an affiliate deal with this? 3 ways

1. Review the product that’s being pushed.

If you have time, see what the product is all about. And if
you really want to help your leads/visitors, test out the
customer service claims (if any).

2. Review the MARKETING MATERIAL!

Most times companies will share material with you before
they launch, or begin to market. This is where you should
have your BS detector on FULL POWER. You’re probably
a trader or know enough to know what’s realistic…apply
that to what you promote.

3. Ask company AND other affiliates for feedback on #’s.

Companies you know/trust will tell you up front the good or
the bad…but you’ve gotta trust them. If you don’t know the
affiliate person/company, then ask other affiliates that promoted
or ASK THE COMPANY FOR OTHER AFFILIATES THAT PROMOTED!

If you ask me about the numbers, I hope you can trust me, but I’m
never prideful enough to not think you need more sources…so just ask.

Again this is just my 2 cents on the matter…LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!

Love reading the comments and debating points if necessary.

Until next time…

Brad

P.S. This PS is a direct pitch for you to become an affiliate partner for my clients 🙂

Rockwelltrading.com Affiliate Program (70% click to lead, 8% lead to sale, 90 day cookie)

TradingConceptsInc.com. OptionsMD relaunch that had 2.86EPC last time! Feb 21st it begins


Tags

affiliate marketing, dealing with refunds (re-sellers), financial products to promote


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  • Great topic Brad. Interesting to note that we track refunds on the products we own and the products we promote through affiliate deals. We also track refund rates on our affiliates who promote our stuff.

    It is interesting because refund rates can vary greatly on the source of the leads and the quality of the list being promoted to.

    I agree with you about the SUPER hype marketing though… it sets up a new customer for disappointment and thus… a refund.

  • Good points, Brad. The key is what you said, about “Good Products”. I have, over the last 12 years, had less than a 2% lifetime-of-my-trading-business refund/cb rate, of thousands of purchases. I’ve heard that the internet marketer-promoters who sell (what I feel are rip-off overpriced) $1997 trading products are getting over 15-20% + refund rates.

    That means their products are utter crap. If you’re getting more than a 10% refund rate it means your products are BS.
    Much of the content produced by “internet marketers pretending to be traders” simply does not work, and it’s produced by hucksters who get affiliate-launch model Junk to market, so of course the refunds are high.

    Affiliates: if you promote crap products to your list, they lose trust in you, rightfully, and opt out and don’t buy the next time you promote during some product launch. If you want high sales like I generate to my lists, you need to only work with top-published industry experts whose content is actually HELPFUL to traders, not trying to hustle $800 commisshes on overpriced $1997 garbage.

    Fact: last year was one of my best ever. Because I “inherit” and win over traders who come to me after being burned by those ripoff $1997 product launch pitchfests promoted by trader-hucksters out there. Be careful and selective about whom you promote for. Your traders deserve the best. They’re no dummies, and will rightfully refund crap overpriced stuff that’s hustled to market. Treat your traders with integrity.

    Like Brad says in point 1 above, REVIEW the Product Yourself first, and see if it’s actually useful. That by the way does Not mean, does it have fancy graphics and looks nice and pretty. So does a hooker. lol. Instead, check the AUTHENTICITY of the Trading tips — do the trading tactics actually work? Is this product something you’d promote to your parents and best friends? If the answer is “heck no, it’s overpriced crap”, which a lot of stuff is, then Refuse to promote (or be polite and say “sorry but my schedule is full for emails”) and instead promote things from genuine experts (published, well respected industry experts) instead. Just sayin.

    Respectfully,

    – Ken Ca|houn

  • I agree with both Brad and Doug…

    Each affiliate has a different type of follower within their lists. Quality of lists and mentality of each list will react completely different to each offer thus give a wide range of refund levels.

    Best strategy for low refunds rates are to show real results, provide customer support in the same day, and run your business to benefit the subscribers the best you can. The money is in the Renewals…

  • Nice article, Brad!

    Chris and Doug make great points … and the other thought worth considering is the guarantee.

    We’re seeing an onslaught of consumers making online purchases with no intention of keeping the product – they’ll simply buy, download and return within the guarantee period.

    You can reduce the returns by doing a number of things:
    1. having a performance guarantee (ideally, plus an extra bonus if they use the product)
    2. instantly deploying stick strategies to counter buyers remorse
    3. give your customer an immediate to-do item for some ‘instant gratification’ in order to get them to take the next step forward in actually using the product.

    Remember, if they don’t actually USE the product – what do you think the chances are that they’ll buy another product from you? USAGE increases your long-term customer value.

    Thanks again, Brad!

    Charlie

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