Hi guys,

I'd love your opinion on my situation

I'm writing a sales letter for myself at the moment and I want to use the credibility of other authors. Here's what I mean.

I wrote an info product, and I used other people's ideas in there in my own words. As you know, this is perfectly legal unless these ideas are somehow patented. In my product, this is not the case.

Now what I'd like to do is tell people on the page that the methods discussed in my book are used by people like Guru#1, Guru#2, etc.. which is all true.

However, is it ethical and legal to feature other experts in your ad and borrow their credibility?

I'd love to hear your opinion and, in the case of legal comments, any references to where I can learn more.

Thanks,
Erik

Hi Erik,

I think as long as what you say is true (and not slander or libel) then there probably isn't a problem either ethically or legally. Don't quote me on this - you may need to get legal advice.

However, there may be a problem if these people feel that you are taking advantage of their credibility or if they just don't want to be featured as part of your piece. Even if you are safe from a legal point of view, it may not be such a great idea to get these "gurus" offside. So you may want to ask their permission first.

Not only that, but is there a danger of readers going to find their resources rather than buying yours? In other words, might you be doing the advertising for your competition?

So I would change the question from "is this ethical/legal" to "is it wise?".

Hope this helps,
Jane

Erik,

I don't think you have a problem legally (although of course I'm not qualified to offer legal advice). The thing to watch out for is if you use their name without their consent and they find out about it and don't like it, they may not want anything to do with you.

So if you anticipate having potential future relationships of any kind with these people, I would ask for their blessing first.

Otherwise, I don't see anything wrong with it. Like a third-party testimonial.

John

Erik,

I am not exactly sure what you are thinking of - a lot depends on the specific wording - but if I discovered my name being used to advertise someone else's product without my permission, and in such a way that it implied an endorsement to someone who was not reading ultra-carefully, I would be very angry and possibly angry enough to get a lawyer involved.

And if you think certain people are famous enough not to notice what you're doing, think again. I received a whining email once from a very famous marketer when I had posted a three-star review of his book on Amazon, expressing some reservations about his point of view while also praising the book. It amazed me that this very productive guy was tracking what people said about him, and the tone of his email has forever soured me on him as a person. I can't use his name, because he might see it and send me another whining email!

Marcia Yudkin