[mtlynch]

Author here. Happy to answer any questions or take any feedback about this post.

I wrote it a few months ago and submitted it at the time[0], but it didn't seem like it was a match for HN. I was quite surprised when I woke up to find a tweet from a friend letting me know it was on the front page.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24144103

[jaclaz]

If I may, I am not convinced that the "professional way" solved anything.

Of course just my opinion, but I read:

>In the meantime, how do you wish to resolve the matter? What outcome are you wishing for?

as an amicable prompt to find a way to solve a trifling matter in a short time.

I mean, the "professional way" has nothing to do with managing to escalate to the CEO (how exactly did you manage to get his e-mail?).

Besides, a sentence like "I will seek other means to recover the money owed." is ambiguous enough to be easily read as a threat, as there may be "other means" that are not legal.

So - still as I read it - you hassle the CEO of a company, and Mr. Herscu is tasked to understand what the issue is about, and as soon as he finds out that the matter can be solved with paying 88 US$ he pays, problem solved.

[mtlynch]

Thanks for reading!

Yeah, it's tough to say what would have happened with a different approach. I'm obviously biased, but I still feel like the communication style made a big difference. Given how hostile Herscu was in the first email, I don't think I would have reached successful resolution had I just angrily demanded payment.

>I mean, the "professional way" has nothing to do with managing to escalate to the CEO (how exactly did you manage to get his e-mail?).

No, that's a critical part of it. The thing I learned from patio11's article was how valuable it is to navigate their bureaucracy and get to someone who has incentive to help you.

Everyone else at the company who was emailing me had the email "[firstname]@kissmyketo.com". I looked up the CEO's name and confirmed the email by Googling "[e-mail]", which turns up several of the company's old blog posts that invite readers to email him directly.

[jaclaz]

Well, I am not seeing anything hostile in the way Mr. Herscu approached you.

And even if there was something (still the way I am reading between the lines) he was likely told by his CEO - to put it blatantly - "Hey, get this sucker threatening me off my back".

But yes, if it is possible to bypass all the lower levels, it is a good move, I had the privilege of knowing personally a few top CEO's/entepreneurs/influential people, and they always recommended me "Always talk to the higher in grade".

[jldugger]

Pardon my ignorance on the keto lifestyle, but do you think that 10 bucks per loaf of bread is a reasonable price? Even the reviews on their website indicate a lot of people think it's expensive.

Obviously your keto site has a lot of products, but given the energy in this particular affiliate writeup, have you seen their product in retail anywhere?

[mtlynch]

Thanks for reading!

>do you think that 10 bucks per loaf of bread is a reasonable price? Even the reviews on their website indicate a lot of people think it's expensive.

Eh, it's sort of like anything else. People spend thousands of dollars on speakers, which is an unreasonable price to me but a reasonable price to the buyer. If you want bread that fits into the keto diet, "reasonable" is just a matter of what it's worth to you.

I also think that for many medium-to-high-income consumers, paying a $7 premium on a food they want is not that significant.

But I've never seen their product in retail stores. I put in the effort on chasing down the money more out of principle than hopes that I'd get any significant money out of the deal.

[jldugger]

> I put in the effort on chasing down the money more out of principle than hopes that I'd get any significant money out of the deal.

Right, I'm just wondering what due diligence looks like before you go to the effort of putting a new affiliate program into effect. Like 'is this a real product, do they actually sell things, and deliver them.'

Their 'find us in retail locations' lists GNC as a retailer, and GNC lists "Keto Burn capsules" as their only product line carried from KMK. I... am suspicious of that.

[rexreed]

It sounds to me like you've uncovered potential affiliate fraud and were willing to settle for a small sum. Honestly, they should be more scared about your article uncovering their bad business practices -- they'll lose more from that than the $88 you settled for.

However, despite the title including the word "debt", this is not a "debt" you were collected because the exact amount was not discussed. Instead, $88 just seemed like a mutually agreeable number. But it could have been a lot higher or a lot lower.

Basically, you just agreed to settle and not continue to press your valid claims of potential affiliate fraud.

[mtlynch]

Thanks for reading!

Basically, you just agreed to settle and not continue to press your valid claims of potential affiliate fraud.

What would have been a better course of action?

Even under the most optimistic estimates, they owed me less than $500. I don't have access to their sales data, so I don't have hard proof that they're committing fraud. The company's legal team could just turn around and say, "Oh, our rep was mistaken when they said we're not following our own policy. We actually do pay according to our published agreement, but you didn't make any sales during that time period."

I could have pursued options for some sort of class action lawsuit with subpoenas for their sales data, but that's a much bigger time and financial commitment than I wanted to put in.

[rexreed]

Well first of all, do you plan to continue to do business with this unscrupulous company?

Second, what is your general position on business ethics? If you get yours, then is it ok for them to be potentially screwing others? Basically are you of the perspective that as long as you're taken care of, who cares about the others?

You're right, a class action would be the result here, and maybe it's not worth it for this fleabag of a company and the potential outcome you might get.

But I think you might want to rethink what this article is about.

This article, despite the title and claims has little to do with a professional note-taking approach. Rather it's "How I uncovered potential affiliate fraud, and I agreed to settle with them for a small amount rather than fight them."

[mtlynch]

>Well first of all, do you plan to continue to do business with this unscrupulous company?

I don't. I stopped doing business with them after the exchange with the co-founder.

>Second, what is your general position on business ethics? If you get yours, then is it ok for them to be potentially screwing others? Basically are you of the perspective that as long as you're taken care of, who cares about the others?

I do care about the others, but I also don't think I'm obligated to spend months/years of my life leading a class-action lawsuit on their behalf.

Short of that, I don't have a good way of contacting their other affiliates at scale. I directly reached out to some of the affiliates they feature as success stories, and I reached out to other keto bloggers, but none of them were that interested in talking to me. I think there's so much shady behavior in keto affiliate advertising that the affiliates either (a) didn't care about the particulars as long as their absolute payout was decent and/or (b) didn't want to engage with a random blogger they don't know who's possibly just a disgruntled affiliate.

I wrote the article so that anyone who Googles the affiliate program will find out about their behavior. This is pretty outside the subject matter of my normal blog posts. If I was looking to write something that would appeal to lots of readers, I'd write about my usual subjects of solo entrepreneurship or software development.

What obligations do you feel I'm failing to meet here?

[xeromal]

Exactly. If you start slinging shit, who knows if they try to get you for slander. Even if it doesn't stick, it'll cost you time and money fighting it. I believe your approach was perfect. You were able to assert your rights with them and they complied. Mission accomplished.

[dcminter]

Strong disagree with the sibling comment. I thought it was an easy read and the timeline was clear.

I do think it ran a little long, but no worse than that.

[mtlynch]

Thanks for reading! Glad to hear you had an easy time following the details.

[fourstar]

It’s incredibly scattered. Like you just dumped whatever was on your mind and clicked publish and walked away.

[mtlynch]

Thanks for the feedback.

I did spend several hours writing and editing it over a couple weeks, but I understand it might not feel cohesive.

The challenge was that there were a lot of details to cover to explain the background. The email exchanges were a bit convoluted because they involved a lot of backreferences to previous events or other screenshots. I wanted to tell the story in an interesting way while presenting the raw evidence instead of just summarizing everything and asking the reader to assume I'm being fair, but I can see how all the screenshots and blockquotes might have made it feel cluttered.

[fourstar]

Cheers. Wasn’t trying to be a prick about it on purpose. I’m brutally direct.

[bitcharmer]

Looks like you've read a different article then.

This write up is very well structured and reads very easily.