I’ve seen this infomercial a few times:
A young guy with dark hair is walking on the beach explaining his moneymaking system. He repeats several times that the key is placing small advertisements in the classified section of a newspaper.
I understand how envelope stuffing, and pyramid schemes work but can’t tell from the information he gives what his “system” is.
Has anybody seen/know about this?
I’m ashamed to say that I fell for this, about five years ago. You send him $35 and he sends you five booklets. One is a listing of every major newspaper in the US and Canada. Another is a collection of such excellent :rolleyes: moneymaking tips as “buy low and sell high”. Another one explains how you can resell items you buy at flea markets and yard sales in newspaper classified sections across the nation. Oh, and he also encloses an offer to get your own 900-number for $X per year and how you can advertise that 900-number in the newspapers.
This last, of course, is the heart of the scam. They’re very aggressive at selling this 900-number privilege…they actually telephoned me three times in the course of a month to try to get me to buy in. I had, fortunately, come to my senses after I got the initial package and managed to fend them off to the point that they didn’t call anymore.
The deal with the 900-number is that you get a personal extension number, which the people who dial into the 900-number will enter. This is the way they identify whose ad triggered the caller’s hormones. You get x percent (usually single or even fractional digits here, i.e. 1% or 0.5%) of the amount that the call is charged to the caller. Of course, the fact that you’re not only competing on the classified page with professionals who run these ads, but with other people in your area running this same guy’s 900-numbers, your market share is so marginal that the $100-odd dollars you put out for the right to get into this structure has gone where the poopie goes.
Thank god/dess that I was actually too poor to buy into this thing at the time.
jayjay
And I should probably also point out that not only are they getting the mark to pay for the privilege of “owning” a share in a 900-number that probably several hundred thousand other people have a share in, but they’re getting their number advertised at absolutely no cost to them! If you fall for this, you pay for all the advertising you do for this number. Some of their suggestions go beyond the newspaper classifieds as well. They suggest that placing your tiny ad in a national periodical is an excellent way to draw attention to the 900-number. Also, if your zoning laws allow, a billboard is great at drawing attention!
So not only the amount you’re paying to “lease” a share of this 900-number, but the advertising as well. Sounds like a good deal…for the scammer.
jayjay
and/or, you place an ad in a variety of papers saying “earn scads of $$ for doing nothing while you’re at home” , need to send in $35 for information. The information you’d get is a sheet of paper saying “place an ad in lots of papers telling people you can earn scads of $$ while doing nothing at home” and get them to send you $35.
Thanks jayjay.
That’s exactly what I was curious about.
Wring has it closest to what I’ve seen.
Fortunately that’s “seen” and not “participated in”.
Eevn in my local podunk newspaper, the classifieds section always seems to have anywhere from three to ten ads in various sections saying things like “Work at home, no envelope-stuffing” or “Be your own boss, learn how now” or “Make extra money in your spare time”.
All of which have either a 900 number, or one of the various other toll numbers, or, most often, a web address for makemoneyfromhome.com, lotsofcash4you.com, freemoneyfromhome.com and all sorts of other variations.
But at least the OP had it right and knew it was a scam from the start.
Remember, there’s no free lunch. If somebody actually knew how to make lots of “free” money that DIDN’T involve selling that idea to other people, do you think he’d be telling other people how to do it?
It’s like asking why psychics, if they know so much, don’t play the stock market or bet on horse races.
For that matter- getting even further off the subject- why don’t psychics call ME when I have a problem? And just how does telepathy work over a long-distance phone call anyway?
Amusingly enough, Miss Cleo sent me an e-mail a week or so ago…
jayjay (honest!)
That’s the one I spent $15 bucks on.
I wasn’t really expecting it to turn into anything - and I certainly didn’t buy the mailing list they were also trying to peddle. That’d be the sucker mailing list my name was added to when I sent 'em the money, BTW.
$15 for curiousity dispelled and a quick education in scammery.
Classic pyramid scheme.
By not using the US Mail, it’s not a chain letter, and the guv’mint can’t do much about it.
By generous estimates, about 1,000,000 people in America read “The Straight Dope”. That still leaves 279,000,000 unenlighted people that would send in their money.
Present company excepted, of course. I’m sure they were just doing research for Uncle Cecil. :D:D