My first introduction to the Internet marketing world was learning about the business model of affiliate marketing. There was this particular mentor that I followed for a while and I was amazed by the lifestyle he was portraying on his YouTube channel. He lived in a penthouse apartment, owned two luxury cars, and pretty much earned money in his sleep.

But somewhere in the back of my mind, I felt like it was too good to be true and never bought his $997 digital course that he always advertised.

Once in a while I do check in to see what he's up to. Apparently, he launched a more robust affiliate marketing digital course a year ago.

During the launch, I looked at the sales page and he was selling the course for $2500 after a 50% discount.

But what bothered me was what he wrote on top of the Buy Now button. It said in big red text...

"NOTE: Unfortunately Due to Capacity the Price Will be Doubling SOON"

I checked the sales page again a few days ago and he actually dropped the price to $797.

If you're going to pull a scarcity tactic like this one, don't fake it, otherwise you'll be seen as a dishonest person. And he's not the only one. There are a lot of other Internet business mentors that do this.

For example:

When they do "live" webinars and a popup appears towards the end with a countdown timer and link that takes you to their shopping cart page. When the timer runs out, you think you've lost your one chance to buy their product. Nope. Just register for another one of their "live" webinars and you'll have another chance to buy it.

Or when there are countdown timers on sales pages. Once it hits zero, you supposedly can never access the page again. Want to know a cool secret? Just delete your browser cookies and the timer resets.

Don't fall for these fake scarcity tactics. It's a shameful attempt to push people over the edge to buy their products.

I'm not saying you shouldn't use scarcity tactics in general. They are indeed effective, but there are better and more genuine ways to do it.

For example.

One of the most entertaining email copywriters and publisher, Ben Settle, sells a monthly newsletter called "Email Players." He mails out a different newsletter to his subscribers every month. And he claims he barely sells back issues (I'm wording it that way because I'm personally not a subscriber, so I can't say with 100% certainty). With that model, there's already scarcity built in it. If people don't subscribe before he mails a new issue out, chances are they'll almost never get their hands on that issue.

I'll give one more.

Let's say you're launching a new product or program. You can give bonuses when your audience buys your product or program before a specific date. So let's say you launch on Sunday. If people sign up before Tuesday, they'll get XYZ bonuses. If they sign up before Thursday, they'll get XY bonuses. If they sign up before Sunday, they'll only get X bonus. And if they sign up any later, they get no bonuses.

Makes sense?

Good.