[patio11]

Money-back guarantees virtually invariably raise sales in A/B tests. I have never seen one decreases sales in a statistically significant fashion. I have never seen a guarantee meaningfully increase refund rates. (No customer of mine has refund rates worth mentioning. I will literally mail paper checks to people who bought my software five years ago and my refund rate is below ~2%.) If you have data to the contrary, I bow to the data.

As it happens, I have a product launch coming up. I will offer a money back guarantee, and I will do it in an A/B test. If I am wrong, and the guarantee statistically significantly decreases sales, I will a) have a cow and b) donate a cow to charity. If I am right, you don't have to do anything, because being consistently right at this sort of prediction makes propositional bets with authors a distinctly inferior way to increase one's income versus just being consistently right at this sort of thing.

[lutusp]

> Money-back guarantees virtually invariably raise sales in A/B tests.

The original poster didn't make a money-back guarantee, as in "If you aren't happy with my book, I will refund." Instead he made a claim about increasing the number of clients, i.e. a performance claim ("I'm serious about refunding anyone who ends up not being able to raise their client rates."). Here's the law on that issue:

URL: http://nationalparalegal.edu/conlawcrimproc_public/FreedomOf...

Quote: "Commercial speech holds a special place in First Amendment analysis. It is not an unprotected category of speech, nor is it afforded the same level of protection as non-commercial speech. In addition, there are sub-categories within commercial speech. Truthful commercial speech is afforded protection while false or deceptive commercial speech is not protected."

Here is another account that makes the same point:

URL: http://www.wisbar.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=News&Templ...

Quote: "In 2004, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) banned Kevin Trudeau from appearing in any infomercial promoting any product except publications, which are protected by the First Amendment, provided he did not misrepresent the content of the publication."

What these rulings mean is that the contents of a book are protected by the First Amendment, but promotional claims about the book are not.

[jleader]

You keep talking about "commercial speech" being different from "non-commercial speech", as if that explains your claim that "If you aren't happy with my book, I will refund." (claim A) is a safe thing to say, but "I'm serious about refunding anyone who ends up not being able to raise their client rates." (claim B) isn't.

But both claim A and claim B look like commercial speech to me!

Both are promises to provide refunds under certain specified conditions. One, claim A, offers refunds under the broad and hard to dis-prove condition of "aren't happy with the book", while claim B offers refunds under a somewhat narrower and slightly easier to verify condition of "not able to raise rates". How is claim B more dangerous than claim A?

And comparing commercial speech vs. the contents of a book is irrelevant, since neither claim A nor claim B is contained within a book.

[lutusp]

> But both claim A and claim B look like commercial speech to me!

One of them offer a refund without making any kind of claim, the other makes a claim about the contents of the book and about what outcome purchasers have a right to expect. They are treated differently under the law.

But I can see you are simply not going to get this, no matter how many cases I quote for you, how many legal decisions.

> How is claim B more dangerous than claim A?

One of the statements offer a refund without making any kind of claim about the book's effect. The other makes a claim about the book's effect.

Imagine you are a doctor, offering a miracle cure that is in the pages of a book. To one group you say, "If you're not happy with my book, I will give you your money back."

To the other you say, "My book provides a cure for cancer. If your cancer isn't cured, I will give you your money back."

The first pitch is protected under the First Amendment because it doesn't describe the book's contents or effect, and therefore it doesn't matter what the book says. The second doesn't have First Amendment protection, because it's commercial speech that makes a claim about the contents of the book. In the second case, the author makes the mistake of making a claim about the book and its contents in his promotion, outside the protection of the First Amendment.

How is that in any way complicated?

URL:

http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-12-16/news/30523850...

Quote: "Trudeau insisted his First Amendment rights were being infringed, and began advertising books rather than diet supplements in new infomercials ... [but] the new ruling requires Trudeau to give back all the money he made from selling books during the infomercial ban."

The reason Trudeau lost his case, even though he was selling books, is because he didn't just sell the books, he described what the reader should expect from them in his pitches. It was on this basis that the court ruled against him.

[ahoyhere]

Are you seriously comparing a guy who says "Raise your professional service rates or your money back" to a guy peddling a snake oil cancer cure… or are you trolling to see what shakes out?

[lutusp]

The person's reason for speaking isn't the issue, the law is the only issue. My point is performance claims are actionable, but the contents of a book are not.

Do you really think people only initiate legal actions when someone has actually misrepresented something? That's naive. My point was the OP was taking an unnecessary risk, when he could simply have said "If you're not happy, I'll refund your money."

How complicated is that?

[lutusp]

>> When someone makes a performance claim about the contents of a book ...

> Money-back guarantees virtually invariably raise sales ...

It would be nice if we both were discussing the same topic. A performance claim is not a money-back guarantee.