My name is Matthew Bredel and as of March, 2007, I am a full-time, work-at-home internet marketer.
For close to 10 years, I worked for a defense company which was an OK job, but I was so uninspired in life and frankly, I needed some more money. That is when I first discovered internet marketing! Now I admit that I didn't start making thousands in my first couple of months (in fact, I lost my shirt!), but I finally saw the "internet light"...
Over the past month, I have felt a lot of rumblings throughout the internet due to the lasted FTC rulings on Testimonials and Endorsements. This IS going to change the way we market online, but who really understands this? Here, I sit down with expert internet law attorney Linda Goodman (from TheGoodmanLawFirm.com) to help me understand the fate of my own websites and its affect on this internet marketing world.
EXCLUSIVE ONE-HOUR PODCAST
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Is this the end of affiliate marketing and the internet as we know it?
Ever since the FTC announced their new regulations concerning endorsements and testimonials on the internet, we have seen major chaos erupting throughout the internet marketing world.
- Can you still sell online?
- Can you use testimonials?
- Can you still make a profit from blogs?
- Are review sites legal?
- Is affiliate marketing dead?
- Are these new FTC laws going to protect or hurt the online consumer?
- Is this the beginning of more government regulations on the internet?
So many questions, and frankly, I personally can’t answer these…
Luckily, renowned and well-respected internet law attorney Linda Goodman from TheGoodmanLawFirm.com sat down with me for over an hour to explain what these new FTC rulings on endorsements and testimonials mean not only for my own business, but the state of internet marketing, in general.
She left no holds barred and answered everything I could dish at her…and some of it was a bit troubling!
But let me tell you: These new FTC regulations are not the end to online business success! You just need to be educated on what is happening, though.
This one-hour podcast will explain to you what is going on with the FTC and the internet, who it is going to affect the most, and what you can do to protect your current websites (or any new website you plan to create).
By the way, Linda Goodman WAY over-delivered in the information that she provided in this interview. Don’t take this information for granted! Thanks for your time, Linda, and allowing me to share this with my clients!
cheers…matt
P.S. I welcome your questions and comments about this topic and the interview below!
EXCLUSIVE ONE-HOUR PODCAST
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Thanks for doing this recording. The more our government intrudes on our privacy the more irritated I become! It is too bad when a few bad apples can cause all these problems for those of us who are trying to stay on top of things and do things right.
My personal opinion is that this is a takeover of the internet by this administration just like he did the car industry, banking, credit cards….
October 22nd, 2009 at 4:13 pm
It is funny that you bring up politics in your comment, Paul, since I see that Senator John McCain is now stepping into the arena, too:
http://mashable.com/2009/10/22/john-mccain-wants-to-block-fccs-net-neutrality-rules/
I agree that the more the government starts to control the internet, the more freedom we will lose. As we discuss in the podcast, this is an industry that needs to clean itself up in order for it to move forward! cheers…matt
October 23rd, 2009 at 7:08 am
When people take advantage of people through bad practices than what else can you expect but regulations. As marketers we need to be sensible and not spoil the market place we work on otherwise we will get regulated that only a few will be able afford working.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:32 am
[...] for us we are members of Tru-Guru and as a consequence we subscribed to Matthew Bredel blog site “inside the marketing mind“. Anyway, Matt undertook an interview with a [...]
November 10th, 2009 at 2:53 am
Hi Matt this is Kenneth Young and I just finished listening to your MP3 that was in the November post Exposing the FTC Regulations on Endorsements and Testimonials.
I think that it is very unfair The Last Man Standing(The Affiliate) will be the one who is going to be holding the bag as for example lets say I am an affiliate who is promoting a program were the author of the affiliate program is overseas and we all know at this time the FTC does not have any power at bringing these crooks down so how in ….. can the affiliate find out if this program is legal or is not.
We here so much about were we affiliates have to check these companies out well how can I do this when the FTC cannot do it. As far as checking out companies that have products for us affiliates here in Canada or the United States do you think that they will give a complete and honest history on their company. The only way that will happen is if the little guy (Us Affiliates) will hire lawyers to this and you know what this is going to cost.
I have put off getting seriously involved in any affiliate programs and it is beginning to look like I made the safest move for me. I am sticking to writing blogs on a general nature and I am looking at some programs out there but have not made a move yet.
In my opinion were there is so much confusion on the FTC rulings that there will be a mass of businesses leaving the internet and very few beginners taking the chance of starting an online business because of the fear of making a mistake and having the feds wrongly shut them down. Hope I am wrong on this.
I guess I am afraid,
Kenneth C Young
February 20th, 2010 at 7:34 am
Hey Kenneth,
I thought your points were good…so much so, I wrote a post about it today:
http://www.matthewbredel.com/1224/are-affiliates-getting-screwed.html
cheers…matt
February 22nd, 2010 at 7:49 am