Stephen Ducharme, ContactThem scam

While surfing the other day, I saw an ad someone had posted about a program called "ContactThem" which claimed that they would pay you $4800 to add their links to your website for one month. That sounded like a great deal to me! I have a website..and I like money.. especially free money! Anytime someone wants to pay me lots of money for doing something as simple as cutting and pasting a link onto my page, I'm there! Of course, being the skeptical soul that I am, I decided to do a little investigating before rushing in to claim my $4800. I clicked the link and it took me to a website for a product called "Contact Them" that asks you to sign up and download their software. After my big Zangdo virus fiasco, I'm pretty darn careful now about what I download, plus they asked you a few questions before you download it, so they can "personalize" the software to you. Meaning, make sure they send you the right hype and scam page, targeted towards telling you what you want to hear based on what you're looking for. The questions are 'what describes you the best:", and lists choices, like "I'm an internet marketer interested in promoting affiliate programs" or some such thing, and "Main reason why you want the Contact Them software" again with some choices. They also ask for your phone number along with your other contact information, and it is marked as 'required". It says "your account will match your phone number". Hmmm.. this made a few bells go off.

I Googled Stephen Ducharme, "Contact Them scam" and "Virtual Contact, Inc", and what I found out is that Stephen Ducharme is the self-proclaimed "Free Ad Guru" and claims he never pays for advertising. I also found out that, while his website claims this is brand new software they spent four years developing, there were several complaints on a few message boards from around 2005 for a product by this name, and also something called "My Affiliate Finder", which by the name sounds like it may be the same type of software he's now calling "ContactThem". In or around 2003, there were complaints about other products from Stephen Ducharme , in particular one called "How to get 1million visitors on your website without paying a dime in
advertisement" The complaints said that his promised customer support is pretty much nonexistent, and they do not answer emails or phone calls. In addition to that, after you purchase something from this guy's company, they call you and try to talk you into bigger things, like "coaching"., with high-pressure sales tactics. They ask you questions about your credit cards and available balances, and what you end up paying is the amount of your available balance! YIKES! Read what happened to this poor guy http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/072/ripoff0072066.htm.

These complaints are all a few years old, and I didn't find any complaints recently specifically geared towards the ContactThem software, so maybe he's cleaned up his act.. or maybe it's just too new, since he says it just launched.

The ContactThem offer has two parts.. the software program itself, and the affiliate program...which is the part where he claims you can make "up to" 4800.00 your first month for simply placing their ads on your site. Of course, you have to read the disclaimer at the bottom of the page

"These figures of earnings are examples to help you understand the earning potential - You can make more or less. There are no guarantees of income. *You are NOT paid per click, per impressions or for the period of time our banner is exposed on your website; you are paid per sale generated. You receive a sales commission when members join our paid membership upon your referral or your sub-affiliates'. Recurring monthly commissions are subject to members' renewals. By default, 2 levels of commissions are paid; to access levels 3 to 10, you need to meet each level qualifications. Please take time to consult the qualifications for each level inside the affiliate area that explains everything in details."

This means that you can join as an affiliate for free, and promote the program on your own and try to get people to sign up by marketing it through whatever channels you can find..and possibly make some sales or get people to sign up and upgrade...get them to UPGRADE is the keyword here. You don't get paid for them signing up, they have to upgrade and pay the 49.00 a month before you make any money. Of course, you won't make any real money unless they not only sign up and upgrade, but they then get people under them who sign up and upgrade, etc. Or...you can UPGRADE and pay 49.00 a month to be able to use the ContactThem software to find people to send your ads for the affiliate program to ...and/or promoting the actual software. using their program.. Either way, it's not a simple matter of put the banner on your website and sit back and make tons of cash, like the ads would have you believe.

I will say this for him, he's REALLY, REALLY good at the smarmy sales copy. He knows exactly what to say to make people want to sign up...but he neglects to tell you that it ain't half as easy as he makes it sound. If you do sign up to be an affiliate and you can manage on the free option to find some people who do sign up and actually upgrade, that would be fine. However, we all know it's not that easy. Anyone who has done or is doing internet marketing or affiliate marketing, knows that you have to promote something. You'll have to actively market it. Unless you have a huge mailing list or tons of traffic to your site, you'll need to place ads. Chances are, even if you choose to upgrade and pay the 49.00 a month for the chance to market to the leads they provide you with using their software, a small percentage of those who actually sign up will do anything with the program. Some may upgrade and pay for a couple of months, but most will give up after a few months when the profits they were promised in the ads don't materialize magically. There's nothing wrong in this, it's marketing, and A LOT of programs do it the same way, but it's deceptive, and if people do sign up and attempt to market this affiliate program, they need to be aware that their earnings will most likely, for probably 99.9% of them, never be more than a couple hundred dollars.. if they can manage even that.

This is an FAQ page about the affiliate program...http://www.contactthem.com/affiliateprogram3.php?

Up to this point, one would think there's really nothing wrong with this program, aside from the smarmy and deceptive advertising tactics.. but..

Here's where the scam part comes in:

As a free affiliate you are qualified to earn commisions on your first 2 levels with no qualification, no strings at all.. but from level 3 on you have to qualify to earn commissions by being an active (read: paying) member who has reached $1000 commission earned. A legitimate "affiliate program" does not require you to "qualify" or pay anything in order to collect your commissions. This is not an "affiliate program", it's just a glorified ...and deceptive.. MLM scheme.

What's your compensation plan?

Level 1 = 20%

100% Free - No qualification required
Level 2 = 10%

100% Free - No qualification required

Level 3 = 5%


(To qualify for this 3rd level of commission, you must be an active member of ContactThem software (minimum is $49.95/month)
+ You must have reached $1,000 in commissions earned.)
Level 4 = 2%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 10 members)
Level 5 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 20 members)
Level 6 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 30 members)
Level 7 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 40 members)
Level 8 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 50 members)
Level 9 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 60 members)
Level 10 = 1%

(Qualification: Active member + You must have signed up 70 members)

This brings us to the ACTUAL program.. the software.....

What is ContactThem?

It's software that claims it can find the names of, and allow you to contact with a personalized email, virtually every affiliate marketer of every affiliate program on the planet. It sends emails to these people telling them how much you like their site and would they be interested in becoming an affiliate for your product or service and placing your links on their page. Of course, you don't have to actually go to any of these affiliates's sites, so how do you know if they are even active affiliates? or if they even have a website? Most do, but some do not and market through email or other venues. It does make mention somewhere on the site about "Internet marketers/list owners/affiliates/website owners/promoters/resellers", and it says it will tell you the marketer's stats and activities, so I suppose the program knows which type of marketer they're contacting and everything about them, and tailors the emails to each individual? It claims you won't get SPAM complaints, because it's a personalized email. So what? I get lots of SPAM that's personalized, and unsolicited email trying to sell you something, last time I checked, was still SPAM, and the complaints may very well come.

His sales page claims that you will find lots of "tire kickers" talking bad about him on the internet because they "don't understand him", he's ahead of his time. LOL Well, that's a CYA statement if I ever heard one. Though it is true that a lot of people will cry "scam" if they buy something and don't immediately make a million dollars with no effort, becasue they don't know how to work the program, the majority of scam complaints tend to be true, and I'm betting Mr. Ducharme deserves his reputation.

In theory, this software could actually be really useful in helping you make lots of money, if you can find a bunch of affiliate marketers who are stuck on stupid or complete newbies. If I understand it correctly, the way the program supposedly works is that you find a 2-tier affliate program and sign up, and then you send emails to all of these other affiliate marketers from these other programs that the software finds for you, promoting your affiliate program, and they become your subaffiliates in the program. I don't know about you, but if someone who is not the owner of a product or a company contacts me, asking me to promote their products, I'm gonna know they're an affiliate of that product/program. If it's something I'm interested in, I'll go sign up as an affiliate on my own and get full commissions DUH! I could be wrong. The reason they have subaffiliates is because people to sign up to be one, but I just don't see it happening a lot when you're marketing to current affiliate marketers.. On the other hand, suppose you sign up for the service, you do manage to sign up a bunch of sub affiliates under you, and they put the links to your products on their sites..and nothing happens..or only a few sales happen. This wouldn't be a big deal in normal circumstances, but it is a big deal if you're paying $12,000 a year for the ContactThem service! YEP, you read that right.. $12,000 a year.. payable in convenient monthly installments of just $997.00!! DOUBLE YIKES!! Of course, if you can't afford that, they have the limited version that will allow you to contact 200 marketers every day instead of 1000. There are some marketers who wouldn't think twice about paying that much money per month for leads.. but for most people, that's just not an option.

BOTTOM LINE: I don't think you can really classify this program as a scam per se. It is, however, deceptive marketing, and it is not an affiliate program, it's just a MLM scheme. The whole thing definitely falls under the hype and air category. I am willing to bet also, that once you sign up as a free affiliate, the high-pressure, very persuasive emails will be forthcoming quickly..and A LOT of them. Whatever you do, if you do sign up for this program, whether for free or as an upgraded member.. when they call you, and they almost definitely WILL CALL YOU.. don't TALK TO THEM.. do not let them talk you into ANYTHING, and under NO circumstances tell these people, or anyone associated in any way with this company your personal information, including the balance on your credit card. If they call HANG UP!