I recently downloaded a free ebook in which the marketer (let’s refer to him as AP as in “Associated Press” since his sudden attack of conscience is reminiscent of a whistle blower) ’fessed up to the fact that he owed a significant amount of his success to shady tactics such as the use of fake testimonials, hype, hype and even more hype, as well as the careful placement and manipulation of screenshots as tools of evidence.

Okay if you are predisposed to a delicate constitution this may come as stomach churning shock to you, but to me this is actually old news. In fact (at the expense of being accused of blowing my own horn), in 2006 I wrote about this very issue in my super-downloaded free eBook entitled Best Kept Marketing Secret (downloaded over 60,000 times).

I got a lot of angry and downright abusive emails (which I actually enjoyed reading, they made me laugh…you wouldn’t be far wrong in concluding that I have a thick skin) some accusing me of sour grapes much in the same way as was the Derivatives Expert who tried to alert the SEC and other pertinent authorities back in 1999 that Bernard Madoff was running one big scam!

Anyway back to our coming-clean marketer AP, who went as far as confessing that his mentor drummed the mantra “Fake It Till You Make It” as one of the fundamental cores to attaining the tipping point of online marketing success. In fact allow me if you will to further illuminate the extent of deceit with this quote from AP’s book “…some of you guys may not be aware the cheques shown may be totally not related to what the guy is actually selling….”

Is Confessing To One’s Dishonesty The New Measure Of Credibilty And Honesty?

Well as I stated previously, this confession of having manipulated the tools of mass persuasion (gee whiz would people really do that on the internet) comes as no surprise to me, but what I do find intriguing is the apparent need to reveal the sinful dirty secrets that catapulted one to success in the first place. Why? Why do it at all seeing that it could well backfire in your face!

Well marketer AP is not the first guy to ’fess up to his dirty past, nor will he be the last which lends me to think that this new habit of confessing to your sins once “you’ve made it” is the next and logical step to the attainment of true credibility zenship.

Rattle Snake

Think about it for a second…with the ever increasing competition in the internet marketing arena, it’s gotten harder for your average guru to distinguish themselves from the rest of the rabid marketing crowd (ooops…did I say guru? That’s a dirty word now in the online marketing field; please excuse me). So why not use a bit of reverse psychology to get those prospects out there more endeared and enamored with you…what better way to do that than by confessing?

An added bonus is that within the subtext of your words of confession are echoes of a “sincere” apology from an individual genuinely contrite for what they did and now seeking redemption and forgiveness! A forgiveness you are confident will fully manifest in the form of reinvigorated trust from your prospects!

On the face of it this doesn’t make sense, does it? But actually it does, because remember we are talking about reverse psychology here! The core of this strategy is that your prospects will think, “gee whiz, this is one upstanding chap who has the guts and courage to come clean about his sinful past.”

Yes sirreee…everybody sure loves a fellow sinner!

But to a pupil of the school of skeptiscm such as myself, I cannot but help wonder if marketer AP has truly turned his back on his shadier techniques of yesteryear? I mean who is to say that that figure of $208,000 proudly emblazoned on his free ebook is really the amount he made or just another hyped hype? Besides he all but states that he hasn’t totally given up on those shady techniquess!

That said, I cannot in good conscience decry marketer AP for doing what he did (huh…the sneaky methods or the confession?) because not only is such behavior rife throughout the internet business community but as anthropologist Vilhjalmur Stefansson once opined: “Unethical advertising uses falsehoods to deceive the public; ethical advertising uses truth to deceive the public.”

So there you have it folks…we are being lied to 24/7 by all and sundry!

So in summary in my somewhat humbler opinion as far as I am concerned, as a marketer it’s okay for you to…

Grow The Hype Just Don’t Choke On It!

For more about hype, social proof and manipulation of weapons of mass persuasion read this bit I wrote about Madoff.

Article on fake it till you make it marketing written by Ba Kiwanuka