My Motive for Creating Controversy
A couple weeks ago, I got an email from a fellow marketer and product launch manager Jeff Pezzella. He had read my Jeff Walker “damage control” post and had some questions for me. I gladly answered them.
When I’d finished, I had the makings of another blog post. So rather than keep my answers private, I’ve decided to publish them here. If you have any additional questions for me, please leave a comment.
1: How long did it take you to write that Jeff Walker article?
First draft? Maybe an hour, 90 minutes tops. But then I had a couple guys review it and give me feedback. I made some changes, sat on it for two weeks, then made some minor edits on my final pass through.
So I spent more time on this post than I do on most other posts, mostly due to its sensitive nature. I don’t want to publish something like that unless it’s as bullet-proof as I can possibly make it.
2: Why do you believe so strongly in exposing these guys?
I’m not sure, really.
The few times I’ve exposed people, it was because:
- It was a hot topic on many people’s minds.
- The behavior was egregious.
- I felt I had no other choice.
This is not to say I’m perfect… not by any stretch. I’ve ventured into plenty of ethically “gray” areas (mostly unintentionally) because of what I do for a living (writing sales copy).
But in Eric Graham’s case, he was taking $5,000 and failing to deliver on his promises or honor his refund policy. There were multiple customers who’d spoken out publicly against him on consumer protection sites and even their own blogs.
What’s more, after I published my post, I was contacted by an attorney asking for help locating victims to file a formal complaint with the Consumer Fraud Division of the Missouri Attorney General.
When it gets to the level where attorneys and law enforcement are getting involved, I think it’s way past time to expose criminal behavior. Allowing crime to continue because I feel some vague friendly feelings toward the criminal is not a legitimate excuse to stay silent.
Some readers were upset and thought I should have confronted Eric in private. The thing is, multiple people had contacted him in private already. He had had plenty of chances to rectify the situation, but chose not to. That’s why I helped to publicize the issue. (For the record, I only referenced things that were publicly available online — I revealed no private information.)
In Jeff’s case, the reason I wrote my rebuttal to his blog post was fourfold:
- His post was totally public — so there was no need of concern on my part of revealing any private information.
- I felt his post was highly manipulative — an effort to reframe the story in his own favor.
- He made a blanket statement that people who listen to “bile and hatred” (a.k.a. one particular consumer protection site) are too stupid to be customers — which is a gross oversimplification and total lie.
- I read two uncritical blog posts highly recommending Jeff’s post.
Frankly, the first three reasons were not enough to get me to write the post. I had been thinking about writing the post for two weeks, always deciding against it.
But the fourth reason is what really got me fired up. Upon encountering these uncritical recommendations, I literally stopped my workday and wrote my rebuttal immediately.
3: How are you benefiting from the whistle blowing?
I see some pretty big traffic spikes as well as backlinks from other bloggers when I post controversial stuff.
But… I’m almost positive I’m not going to be getting any referrals from anybody remotely connected to The Syndicate. And I’m probably no longer welcome at most Internet marketing seminars.
4: Are you making any money from it?
Not that I’m aware of. If I have made more sales, I haven’t noticed and would not be able to trace them back to my whistle blowing activity.
My list of subscribers has grown (modestly – just look at my Feedburner count on the side of my blog) and perhaps that will translate into future sales. But that has never been my goal in publishing controversial posts.
I publish controversial content because it’s a part of who I am. In fact, I recently realized that I’ve been a whistleblower for years. I’ll probably end up writing a post called, “My Life as a Whistleblower” with links back to all the exposés I’ve written.
5: Did anything happen in particular via some bad info product/marketing experience that fires you up to write about these dudes?
No, not really. In fact, I’ve had mostly positive experiences buying information products.
I just feel compelled to speak the truth as I see it. And it annoys me when gurus get cocky and prideful and spread blatant lies and manipulations. It annoys me even more when all their followers start butt-kissing in the hopes that maybe one day said guru will mail for them.
Possibly WAY more than you wanted to know, but there you have it.
-Ryan M. Healy
