It’s troubling enough for a company to suggest that consumers who take courses can make serious money by learning “high-demand” sales techniques as telemarketing “finishers.” (Insert your favorite David Mamet quote Glengarry Glen Ross here. ) but continue to make these statements after receiving a penalty notice and endorsement from the FTC regarding a money-making opportunity? How Shameless The settlement with the owners of “sales mentor” programs is a reminder that the law is suspicious of organizations that defraud consumers of their savings through false or unsubstantiated income claims.
The Tennessee defendants conducted extensive publicity online, on social media (primarily YouTube and Facebook), and through telemarketing. The defendants use various names—in addition to “The Sales Mentor,” consumers may also know them as Sales Closer Academy, Inbound Closer, Inbound Closer Accelerator and Sales Pro Academy—claiming to have “helped more than 25,000 people find safe, secure Reliable, stable, life-changing income” typically ranges from $10,000 to $20,000 per month. From as little as $97 for video libraries and sales scripts to as much as thousands for “private” tutoring, consumers paid cash based on the defendants’ wallet-grabbing claims:
- “These commissions can get so large . . . it’s almost impossible not to enjoy a six-figure income that replaces a job, even part-time.”
- “This high-demand skill puts you at the center of a thriving $129 billion industry and can line your pockets with daily commission checks of $980 or more.”
- “If you follow the steps I show you in this video, you’ll see an army of entrepreneurs with multi-million dollar businesses opening their doors to you… We desperately want to give you a Huge commission check of $980 or more because you have their easy-to-learn skills Without it, a business cannot survive. “
In a marketing video, co-CEO Taylor A. Welch said, “We see average monthly revenue potential of $10-$20,000.” In another video, co-CEO Christopher A. Evans claims, “As a high-ticket closer, you can earn around 8-12% of each trade,” and “on average, you can earn $700-$1,000 per trade.” You finalize,” “usually in 45-60 minutes or less. ” Additionally, Director of Sales Payton Welch claimed to tout his own experience with the program:
“Within a week, people were lining up to pay me. In two weeks, I had earned $15,460 in commissions. Within 21 days I looked at my bank account and noticed something crazy. . . I made more money in those 21 days than I had made in 6 months of working. Not to mention I was doing it part-time on my own schedule and only connected via my phone. This way I can earn a steady six figure income on my own terms, wherever I want. “
One of the defendant’s telemarketers told a consumer that after receiving training, people could expect to make “about $1,000 a day, £5 a week, $20,000 a month.” Another telemarketer offered the consumer a dizzying calculation:
“If we work 40 hours a week, well, that means we’re probably on 40 phone calls. The average attendance rate is 80%. So you received 32 calls. Average close rate, we’d say it’s about 30%, but since you’re new, we’d say 25. So for someone new to the game, 25% of those 32 calls is the average close rate, right? So it’s about 7. My math might be a little low, but 7. May I? So for someone with a full-time call-off calendar, 7 times 1,000 is weekly income. . . . This works out to about 28 times a month; about 300 times a year.“
“300” means annual income of $300,000. What the telemarketers didn’t know was that the “consumers” they were selling to were undercover Federal Trade Commission investigators.
According to the Federal Trade Commission, these pie-in-the-sky promises are false or unsubstantiated. In fact, the defendants have no reasonable basis to support their money-making claims because they never systematically tracked the results of the more than 55,000 people who paid for their Sales Mentor products. What’s more, the FTC contacted The Sales Mentor on October 27, 2021, and attached two penalty notices. But as the indictment alleges, the defendants “continued to make deceptive or unsubstantiated revenue claims when marketing their sales mentorship program.”
The complaint names Traffic and Funnels, LLC, various other companies, Taylor Welch, Christopher Evans, Payton Welch and Ashton Shanks, alleging violations of the Federal Trade Commission Act and the Telemarketing Rule. The third complaint, citing the Notice of Penalty Offenses Relating to Earning Opportunities, alleges that the corporate defendants “violated Board decisions of which the defendants had prior knowledge.”
In addition to prohibiting widespread money-making claims and telemarketing practices, the proposed settlement includes a $16,363,073 monetary judgment against all defendants except Ashton Shanks. Although the totals will be partially suspended due to the defendants’ inability to pay in full, Taylor Welch will turn over $600,000 and Christopher Evans $400,000, which the FTC will use for consumer Offer refunds.
The most important point for any company or person receiving a Notice of Penalty Violation is that the FTC has used its statutory authority in six recent cases, and when defendants became aware of conduct in prior FTC cases We will continue to seek appropriate relief for consumers when it has been deemed illegal, but choose to flout the law.
If you know someone who is considering investing their savings in a money-making “scheme” or “system,” Share FTC advice On how to protect yourself from big sales pitches.
