Honesty Is The Best Policy

Lisa from 2 Create a Website brings up a really good point(among many) in her blog entry How to Build Credibility Online. She advises us “to take the good with the bad” when writing about products that we are affiliated with.

After reading the later sentence you might be left saying, “won’t I lose sells if I mention anything negative about the product I’m supposed to be selling to the reader?!?”. Lisa goes on to state that by being honest to your audience they will ultimately “take your reviews more seriously.” This is ”because they don’t appear to be too biased in one direction.”

I think this is an excellent point that Lisa brings up. After all, who are you going to trust more? Someone who goes on and on about how wonderful such and such product is. Than tells you how you can’t live your life without that product. Or a writer that truthfully writes about the pros and cons of a product.

I’m sure you’re like me and you would trust the last writer more than the first. Guess what? I’m going to be a lot more likely to buy something from someone I trust, that I see as a friend. Not just a person yelling out to me that I have to buy a product.

I am ashamed to say it, but I too have been guilty of being the pushy salesman instead of the trusted friend.

Right now, I’m not affiliated with any products. However, in the future when I am I will be sure to include both the negative with the positive.

As Lisa says, “the long-term results of this practice equates to more credibility and sales for you.” It would be good to accomplish this goal while providing honest, useful content to the reader.