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Affiliate Lawyer -> FTC compliance (12)

12-23-2019 11:55 AM #1 smellslikeprofit (Member)
Online Marketing Lawyer?

Hey there,

can anyone recommend some good lawyer regarding ftc rules etc? Want to stay clean in the jungle. :-)

Thank you in advance!

12-23-2019 12:14 PM #2 stickupkid (Senior Moderator)

I am not sure about his up to date knowledge on US market, but give this guy a try; http://www.arnoud.engelfriet.net/
He is the best when it comes to law & internet (in the Netherlands at least)!

12-23-2019 01:39 PM #3 nickpeplow (AMC Alumnus)
Affiliate Lawyer -> FTC compliance

Andrew Gordon
gordonlawltd.com

Completely understands blackhat and the whole affiliate industry. We have used him for years and he can cover every aspect of your business (and new fields including crypto, egaming etc). Actually being in court for FTC defence is his speciality.

Not for sketchy stuff, but guido at MFFA in the Netherlands is an absolutely incredible tax lawyer. Like all Dutch, he is completely solid and totally unphased by the madness.

12-23-2019 05:27 PM #4 taormina (Member)

Want to know the secret to staying out of the FTC's crosshairs?

Excellent customer service. Period, end. I like lawyers. I have lawyers. But lawyers are not the solution to the FTC. Allow me to explain.

First of all, I am not sure what kind of offer you are running. If it's scammy, not amount of lawyering up will save you (File under: Agora Financial).

So if you are in that space and are taking people day after day, no lawyer will mitigate that.

So if your offer is legit, you need to be able to demonstrate the following:
- low charge back rates (under 1% preferably under .05%)
- A published 1-800 customer service number that is FREE for people INSIDE the US to call.
- An actual customer service rep that actually answers the phone during normal working hours. Email is NOT good enough for 7 figure offers!
- A well published refund policy and the ability for your customer service folks to provide immediate refunds over the phone.
- Terms and conditions, privacy policy and contact info on every page.

If you run big volumes, you need to be 1000000% responsive to customer complaints, because if you are NOT, then they trickle down to the FTC and that is where you get in trouble.

You don't need a lawyer if you are following the above, because your customer complaints should be almost non existent and handled by your customer service reps before you ever get into complaint territory.

12-29-2019 09:28 PM #5 proteinbrie (Member)

Maybe you can ring Dan Balsam and see if he's interested.

He must be starving from all those unanswered demand letters throughout 2019.

01-01-2020 07:26 AM #6 smellslikeprofit (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by taormina View Post
Want to know the secret to staying out of the FTC's crosshairs?

Excellent customer service. Period, end. I like lawyers. I have lawyers. But lawyers are not the solution to the FTC. Allow me to explain.

First of all, I am not sure what kind of offer you are running. If it's scammy, not amount of lawyering up will save you (File under: Agora Financial).

So if you are in that space and are taking people day after day, no lawyer will mitigate that.

So if your offer is legit, you need to be able to demonstrate the following:
- low charge back rates (under 1% preferably under .05%)
- A published 1-800 customer service number that is FREE for people INSIDE the US to call.
- An actual customer service rep that actually answers the phone during normal working hours. Email is NOT good enough for 7 figure offers!
- A well published refund policy and the ability for your customer service folks to provide immediate refunds over the phone.
- Terms and conditions, privacy policy and contact info on every page.

If you run big volumes, you need to be 1000000% responsive to customer complaints, because if you are NOT, then they trickle down to the FTC and that is where you get in trouble.

You don't need a lawyer if you are following the above, because your customer complaints should be almost non existent and handled by your customer service reps before you ever get into complaint territory.
Well thanks but this is mostly about running an ecom store. Not if you are just an affiliate and promoting some offers.

01-01-2020 02:25 PM #7 taormina (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by smellslikeprofit View Post
Well thanks but this is mostly about running an ecom store. Not if you are just an affiliate and promoting some offers.

Well I'll be dipped in shit, you don't say! Running an ecom store!

So obviously you don't really know me. Here's a recent thread:
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...our-Own-Offers

I have been running my own offers since 2012 to the tune of about 85,000,000

I left all those zeroes in there so you'd pay closer attention, which is half the battle in this business.

01-02-2020 08:58 AM #8 robert-e (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by taormina View Post
Well I'll be dipped in shit, you don't say! Running an ecom store!

So obviously you don't really know me. Here's a recent thread:
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...our-Own-Offers

I have been running my own offers since 2012 to the tune of about 85,000,000

I left all those zeroes in there so you'd pay closer attention, which is half the battle in this business.
Easy there tiger! No need to go on an ego trip because you misunderstood the context, also you seem to be misunderstanding what the topic is here...its not your self promotion.

Since you ignore many fundamental parts of running the business in your response and focus mostly on customer service it kinda feels like you may be selling something in that field soon.

01-02-2020 02:43 PM #9 taormina (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by robert-e View Post
Easy there tiger! No need to go on an ego trip because you misunderstood the context, also you seem to be misunderstanding what the topic is here...its not your self promotion.

Since you ignore many fundamental parts of running the business in your response and focus mostly on customer service it kinda feels like you may be selling something in that field soon.
First of all, you're not allowed to sell people your own stuff on here, that is made pretty clear in the various TOS posts by the moderators.

Second of all, I am not sure what kind of "customer service" product I could even sell, that sounds really lame.

Third, it's not an ego trip - my experience in this field is a fact, not an opinion

Last, I have been through this sort of stuff and I can assure you there is no misunderstanding whatsoever. What will happen is the original poster will find an appropriate lawyer and then the lawyer will tell him to do all the stuff I said while charging him a big fee. I am trying to save him from that hassle and implement the steps RIGHT NOW without having to lawyer up.

I will repeat what I said again for the benefit of others reading.

FTC compliance is NOT ABOUT you hiring a lawyer to put 10 point disclaimers on the bottom of your pages so that you THINK you will be covered when they come calling. Sure there is a component of that sort of CYA, but the best avenue to FTC compliance is to constantly overachieve with customer service so that you can DEMONSTRATE to the authorities that you run an above board business.

I have direct experience with this - we used to run promotions on our mailing list from Agora Financial. Look them up if you want to see what tangling with the FTC looks like. They all had disclaimers, they had the best lawyers money can buy, and now they are the subject of a really massive FTC complaint because they wanted to push the boundaries of what was ethical and moral and they ignored basic customer service.

01-02-2020 05:36 PM #10 robert-e (Member)

Just a few comments cause to provoke you a little more:

FIRST - your experience (and the monetary aspect which you so eagerly flaunted) is for all intents and purposes a claim, more of an opinion than a fact to readers unfamiliar with you, while it may hold truth it is not something that anyone in a forum will take at face value. Anyone who goes around claiming to have turned over sums that they think are significant to people they don't know runs the risk of being taken for a joke unless they build social/business proof before.
SECOND - your first response to the thread was not useless, run a clean ship is indeed generally good advice. Your insulted response to their feedback is kinda funny, jarring and out of place.
THIRD - yea it would be really lame if you tried to sell anything to anyone!

Anyway I apologise to the OP for having hijacked the thread!

01-02-2020 05:58 PM #11 taormina (Member)

I'm not really sure what value you're adding to this thread, Robert.

01-10-2020 06:40 PM #12 derekgehl ()

Check Chip Cooper. He specializes in FTC compliancy for internet businesses. See him around a lot of the digital marketing events and I've interviewed him on my podcast a few years back. His site is FTCGuardian.com.

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