For the first time last night I lost it about refunds for digital products – more of that shortly but let me set the scene.
We sell digital audio MP3 files from a website www.adam-eason.com and like so many of these digital delivery sites we offer 100 per cent year long guarantee by offering full refund if not suitable for purpose. Having sold thousands of products we have only been asked for a refund about 5 times. Most of them offer an explanation although that is not required. We fulfill our side of things and have not really had a problem with our website sales – that is till yesterday. OK I will get to it.
Because we are looking for experienced affiliates we also have a package of three products offered via ClickBank www.personal-magnetism-and-hypnotic-attraction.com.
Now sales through ClickBank is a totally different story. ClickBank is a very popular site for merchants with digital products who want to offer affiliates the chance to sell their products. I was really amazed when I found that people could ask for their money back and ClickBank always refunds without question. We even had one guy ask for a refund so quickly that he must have still been downloading the products when he was applying to ClickBank for the refund. Now at first I was incensed but in fact the number of people that do this is very small – and far too small to make us leave ClickBank. It is still irritating though as I have seen other merchants complain about this and yet there seems no sensible way to challenge these thefts. The thing that really wrankles though is that ClickBank must be aware of the perpertrators of these on-line thefts but clearly don’t want to get involved. I would love anyone who knows about the working of ClickBank to add some information to this blog.
I will just add a paragraph in praise of PayPal as they do act as a buffer if anyone asks for their money back and correspond with both sides to try to ascertain whether they should return the money. Bravo for PayPal.
So – What Got Me Mad?
OK you have been patient – what got me mad last night?
We were actually phoned by a customer who had bought not one – but two – of our more expensive digital products direct from our website and had the audacity to ask for a refund of both. He quoted our quarantee from our Terms and Conditions and told me he didn’t have to give a reason.
Now – the thing is – why does anyone buy two expensive products for the first time. You buy one and decide then to buy another if you like the first. In fact I would go further and suggest that most people buy a cheap product to find out whether they are likely to need the expensive item and find it useful. The digital product is with them – we clearly can’t take them back.
I was amazed at myself when I found myself challenging his ethics etc. BUT he was embarrassed to the point that he said that he would accept the refund for just one of the product.s.
My Personal Attitude To A Poor Purchase
I have quite a different personal approach to refunds. I buy more than most on the web. I need to as I would never try to sell or review a product without first trying it. The thing is that I have never asked for a refund even though on many occassions now I feel I have been duped and the product is rubbish.
I have to admit there are people selling garbage on the web. Only a month ago I signed up to a membership site that was offering monthly articles and audios for resale. This was from quite a big name on the web. I could not get my head around quite how poor these products were. I have of course cancelled my membership – I just put this sort of thing down to a learning experience. I probably will not slag of the guy publically ( I could have done that here) but I certainly won’t be promoting any of his products.
This way I feel comfortable as there is no way that I would recommend anything that I hadn’t checked out by personal use.
So you can be sure if I recommend anything it will be the bees knees.
