If you're on many internet marketing email lists, you probably got a bunch of promotions for Joel Comm's Adsense Secrets Version 4 last week. Surprisingly, I only got one so I guess I've finally got myself weaned off of most of these lists

Well, as pointed out on 45n5.com (along with a bunch of other places), it seems that Mr. Comm was being a little underhanded with his promotion, and when you bought the book for $9.95 you also got signed up for a monthly newsletter at $29.95 a month.

This was apparently mentioned in the fine print but not on the order page. It's all been changed now so I have to admit I didn't see it myself, I'm only going on what I've read on a number of other sites.

But the fact is, a number of the big names that promoted the product were unaware of the forced-continuity portion, according to their hastily written follow ups once the issue came to light.

I removed myself from Joel Comm's list a long time ago. I bought his original version of Adsense Secrets, and it had some useful tips for the time, but the constant stream of emails that followed, promoting everything under the sun, convinced me to move on rather quickly.

He seems to have a relationship with a lot of the well-known names in the industry, but I wonder how much of that credibility went down the tubes with this particular stunt?

He posted an apology (which looks more like a sales page, incidentally - maybe the whole stunt was orchestrated from the start?) and has posted comments on several other blogs that called him out, blaming his shopping cart among other things. But if I had promoted this for him, I would be wondering how sincere that apology was. Is he truly sorry or did he have no choice since he was being taken to task for it?

I'd think twice before promoting anything from him the next time he came calling.

My local cable company tried something like this a few years back. They added some extra channels for free for a month and then started charging for them after 30 days unless you called and said you didn't want them.

You wouldn't believe the uproar from people on the news, in the local newspapers and any other place they could voice their opinions. People don't like being taken advantage of, and that company is still known for that stunt over 10 years later.

I suspect Joel Comm is going to find this harder to overcome than by posting a simple apology and splitting the newsletter offer into a separate order button (something he obviously can do so should have done in the first place).

It's a good lesson though. If you do something underhanded, chances are good you're going to get caught, and suffer the consequences.

The simple answer is to do the right thing in the first place, even if it take more work or makes you less money.