BEAUTY KLINIC

I’m starting to see more an more diet pills scams hit the market. And many of them are following similar tactics, so I thought I would write an article about one of the primary methods that some diet pill companies are using to scam consumers out of their money: The Autoship. This method seems to be working since we’ve seen more and more companies using this same sales tactic.

So what is an autoship program? Basically it is where the company agrees to mail you supplies (usually monthly supplies) of their product to your home on a regular basis and then charge your credit card when they ship the products.

So what’s so bad about it? It sounds pretty nice and convenient right? Well, it is. If that’s what the consumer wants, then there’s nothing wrong at all with sales practice. Please note, that I am not saying that all autoship programs are evil. An autoship can be good or bad, depending on how the company uses it. Unfortunately, many companies try to trick you into enrolling in the autoship without you knowing about it.

Somewhere along the line, companies (including diet pill companies) found out that they could hide the mentioning of the autoship in the fine print of the ‘terms and conditions’ and virtually no one would know (because not many actually read that fine print) that they were actually agreeing to enroll in the autoship when they made their purchase. And that’s where the scamming started to happen. Imagine their surprise when they started to see what they assumed were fraudulent charges on their credit card. “I didn’t authorize that!” they would say. Oh, but they did. Unfortunately, they did.

It got worse, however, when companies started to offer things for free and get them to accept the terms of the autoship under their nose. Everyone wants something for free, and hence they are able to get thousands to get the “free” trial and get them into the autoship without them knowing about. A few weeks later, they can start charging their credit card. You can quickly see how many cunsumers they are taking advantage of by doing a quick search on some of the internet complaint boards.

Let’s use a fake scenario to show you some of the nasty details that an autoship can have hidden in the fine print. Our friend John sees a very convincing and professional looking ad for a diet pill. He hops on the website and sees that they offer a free trial. How could he go wrong? It’s free! So he plugs in all his personal info and his credit card number to pay for shipping and handling of the free trial, of course. What he doesn’t know is that 1. they’ll often mention in their privacy policy that they have the right to sell his information to third parties, and 2. they now his credit card info on file to use for later shipments.

Once John submits his request, he now finds himself enrolled in the autoship. John will usually have around 15 days to call and cancel the autoship (which he likely won’t even know about unless he read the fine print). If he doesn’t cancel, on the 15 day he will be charged anywhere from $30 to $100 depending on the product (some even charge you for a 3 month’s supply in advance, tripling these charges). He is surprised and irate by the charges and tries to call the company to find out what is going on and to demand a refund. Surprise! They either don’t answer their phone or they give John the run around telling him to call a dozen different numbers, none of which gives him any answers (this isn’t always the case, but seems very common). And before you know it John has a couple worthless bottles of pills and few hundred dollars in charges on his credit card that he can’t get refunded. Sounds like a scam to me!

Again, I want to be clear that not all autoships are scams. Some companies give their customers an option of choosing the autoship while others do a good job of informing them of the autoship. But there are far too many companies who’s main source of revenue comes from taking advantage of consumers who don’t take the time to read the fine print. So be sure to read the fine print and be fully aware of what you might be getting into. We might not be able to stop companies from dong this, but we can certainly make sure that we aren’t scammed ourselves.

With so many diet pills on the market today, with each one claiming to be the new #1 weight loss supplement, how can you possibly sort through all the garbage and choose a diet pill that will actually work for you? When I started reviewing diet pills on my website (Criticalorie.com) over a year ago, I asked myself that same question. Over time, however, I found that it is actually quite easy to discern between the junk and gems if you know what to look for. When choosing a diet pill, you should always take special note of the diet pill′s ingredients, the company behind the product, the price of the pills, and the money back guarantee.

The first thing that I look at when reviewing diet pills is the expected effectiveness of the diet pill itself. You can do this by researching the ingredients in the pill to see if they have been proven in clinical studies (from a third party that is published in a peer-reviewed medical journal or something similar). Don’t believe in-house studies or claims made by the diet pill if they don’t cite the source of such studies (and most don’t). And even if they cite it, go and find it yourself?diet pill companies are good at twisting results around to their benefit. You also need to make sure that they include the good ingredients at the right amounts (this means in the amounts that were shown to be effective in the clinical studies). Many pills have proprietary blends in which they do not disclose how much of each ingredient is in the pill. Avoid these as they usually don’t have the right amounts. The ingredients are what makes the diet pill effective or not. No matter how much fancy marketing they have, if the ingredients don’t show it, it just won’t work.

The next thing that you should look at when choosing a diet pill is the company that is producing the product. Why is this important? How does this effect how well the diet pill will work? I’ll answer with a question: Would you put something into your body that was made by someone who lied about its ingredients? Or maybe by someone who is being charged with making false claims about the results of the product? Perhaps the company is known for ripping people off by charging their credit card more than the consumer agreed to. All these things (and much more) are actually quite common in the diet pill industry. So make sure you get a good feel for the diet pill company itself. A quick search on the internet can usually give you a good idea if the company has encountered many problems or complaints (?Company Name complaints? is usually a good search).

An obvious, but overlooked aspect of the diet pill is the price. Some people look for the cheapest thing that they can find, while others think that the more they spend, the better the product must be. My suggestion is to find the middle road. Cheap pills usually don’t have the best ingredients (or enough to do any good) and ridiculously expensive pills are usually just ripping you off. A good diet pill will usually cost around $40 to $70 per bottle. You’ll find occasional good deals or products that may be a bit lower, but it’s rare.

A quality diet pill will almost always have a good money back guarantee. A ?good’ guarantee is anything more than 60 days (I actually prefer to see 90 days to a lifetime guarantee). Anything less that this doesn’t give you enough time to effectively judge how effective the product is. The company bank on the fact that you probably won’t want to return the product until after the short guarantee is already up. With all the different diet pill on the market, it can be difficult to weed through them to find the ones that will actually be effective at helping you lose weight. But with these guidelines and a little time and research you should be able to narrow them down rather quickly.

I’ve reviewed close to 300 different diet pills now and I’m often asked how it is that I can judge the efficacy of a diet pill without actually taking the diet pill myself. The answer is simple: If you want to know if a diet pill will work, just look at its ingredients. Surprisingly, the actual ingredients in the product are usually what gets looked over when most consumers decide on a diet pill. This brief article will help you as you evaluate diet pills to know if the ingredients included are up to par and will be likely to help you lose weight.

When you start to research the ingredients that are in a given diet pill, you’ll want to be sure that you use credible sources. Unfortunately, many diet pills provide information on the ingredients that sounds more like a sales pitch (because it is) than unbiased statements. A such, you should always verify their cliams by researching the ingredients for yourself. PubMed, Wikipedia, and peer-reviewed medical journals are good sources of unbiased information.

One thing to watch out for are citations of studies on the diet pill website that are made to appear to be about the diet pill itself. Often, if you look up the study, it was a study done on an ingredient in the diet pill, but not on the actual product. I like to see as many citations of studies that I can, but they need to clearly explained so the consumer knows what exactly they are looking at. In addition, some companies will explain the results of some study without citing the reference to the study. In most cases this is because they are just making the study up or the study wasn’t quite as favorable as they want to it be.

The importance to research the ingredients yourself is made clear in the popularity of some of the latest fad diet pill ingredients (for example, acai berry and hoodia gordonii). These two ingredients are touted all over the internet as being the next secret to weight loss. And one would easily be convinced after reading all of the hype. The fact of the matter is, however, that these two ingredients aren’t backed by a single legitimate, well documented scientific study. They may have good health benefits, but they won’t help you lose weigt (despite what all the diet companies tell you).

Unfortunately, once you find a diet pill with proven ingredients your work isn’t quite over. Even though a product may have good ingredients, those ingredients must be included in high enough amounts for them to function as well as they did when they were studied in clinical testing. Most diet pills on the market hide the amounts of their ingredients by using ‘Proprietary Blends.’

The reason that verifying the amounts is important is because most ingredients have only been proven to be effective when they are used in high enough dosages. For example, if a certain ingredient was proven effective in the study when used at 1,000 mg per dosage, the diet pill would need to contain the same amount in order to work in the same way. Most diet pills use only a fraction of the recommended dosages and use a proprietary blend so that you don’t know much of the ingredient is actually included. So when possible, look for diet pills that fully disclose the amounts.

Yet another trick that some diet pills use is including an insanely long list of ingredients. Don’t be impressed by such tactics. In most cases (not all, but most) they can’t fit enough of each ingredient in the pill do any good. They′re just trying to add credibility by making you think there’s a lot in the pill.

Some of what you’ve read may seem like common sense. It is. But it’s so often overlooked by consumers that diet pill companies are making a killing by providing sub-par products. When it comes down it, the ingredients are the only things that make a pill effective. So make sure you do your homework to make the right choices when picking diet pills.

How can you know if a diet pill is effective? Look at the testimonials, right? Or the before and after photos? Or the celebrity that endorses it? Well in actuality it’s none of these things. Sadly, these are the areas that most people base their decisions on, but they are easily fabricated and give almost no indication of how good a diet pill really is. I’ve found that the four areas that really do make a difference when choosing a diet pill are the ingredients in the pill, the company behind the product, the price, and guarantee.

As you may have guessed, the first thing you should look at when deciding between diet pills is the ingredients. The ingredients are what make the pill effective or not effective. Simple right? Well you’d be surprised how many ignore this fact and simply buy the pill with the best infomercial (regardless of the ingredients). When you research the ingredients, make sure you get your information from good sources such as peer-reviewed medical journals. Never take a diet pill’s word for it when it comes to their ingredients (they′ll tell you anything to make a sale). Also, pay particular attention to the amounts of the ingredients in the pill. Some include a good ingredient, but then use a fraction of the amount that has been shown to be effective. Many also use proprietary blends in which they don′t disclose the amounts of the ingredients. This is a pretty good sign that they amounts aren′t up to par with research.

The next thing you should look at when choosing which diet pill is right for you is the company that makes the product. While you can′t judge a book by its cover, you can certainly get a good feel of a diet pill by looking at the business practices the producing company. Do you want to consume something that’s made by a company that has been fined by the FTC for including, but not disclosing, a dangerous ingredient in the diet pill? How about if they′ve been charged with make false claims about their product’s effectiveness? What if they are known to take your credit card information and charge you more than you thought they would? These are all things that you should know. And, by the way, they are all more common than you probably think that they are.

Naturally, you want to look at the pricing of the diet pill. If it’s very cheap, it probably doesn′t have enough quality ingredients to do any good. If it’s price is sky high, you’re probably getting ripped off. For a good diet pill you can expect to pay between $40 and $70. Also, be cautious of scams. If it sounds too good to be true, it is! Always read the terms and conditions of free trials, as they often automatically enroll you in an autoship program designed to suck as much money as it can from your bank account.

The last thing on my ‘must research’ list is the money back guarantee. If they offer anything shorter than 60 days, you should probably look elsewhere. Anything shorter and you won′t have adequate time to judge the efficacy of the product. A good company will stand behind their product because they also know that it works. Also, make sure there are no hoops to jump through in order to get your money back (often hidden in the terms and conditions). With a little research and common sense, you’ll be able to quickly determine if a diet pill is garbage or junk. These 4 areas of focus should help you in your journey.

There are certain tricks that the majority of diet pill companies use to convince you that their product is the best one on the market. To a regular consumer, they aren’t so obvious. But to one who has reviewed hundreds of diet pills, these sketchy tactics stick out like a sore thumb. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to buy something that goes into my body from a company that engages is dishonest marketing. The following tactics are things that you should look out for when buying diet pills.

1. You’ve seen them on nearly every diet pill site you’ve been to - before and after photos. Te problem with before and after photos is that they are often nothing more than photos before and after the person stuck out their gut and shrugged their shoulders. Sometimes, if you look close enough, you’ll realize that they aren’t even the same person. Other times they use the same photos for multiple diet pills. Sounds fishy? It is. So while the fact that they have them doesn’t mean that they’re a shady company, it just means that you shouldn’t be too believing of them either.

2. What’s easier than creating a fake before and photo? Creating a fake testimonial. Again, I’m not saying that testimonials are bad, I’m just saying that anyone can make them up so don’t base any decisions on how many or how great their testimonials seem to be. A marketer can sit down at computer for 5 minutes and leave with a whole page worth of convincing testimonials from all over the nation.

3. Another common thread in many diet pills′ websites are the sky high promises of fast and amazing results. Many try to tug at your emotions and get you to buy. Never buy a product on whim or without researching it first. If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

4. The main thing that I base my diet pill reviews on is the ingredients of the pill. As such, I like to see research backing up the included ingredients. What you often see, however, is that diet pills cite these studies on the ingredients and try to convince you that those studies were on their actual diet pill.

5. Last but not least (in fact, this one’s the worst) is the autoship program. Some companies use autoship programs, which is fine as long as you know that you are enrolling in one (and autoship program is where they mail you product every month and charge your credit card). But we’ve seen more and more companies lately offer a ‘free trial’ to get your credit card info and then automatically enroll you in the autoship without you knowing (technically it was in the terms and conditions, but they are hoping you don’t actually read that fine printed thing). So watch out. It’s one of the worst scams that we’ve seen in a while related to diet pills.

So when shopping for diet pills, keep an eye out for these common tricks. Of course, not all diet pills are bad. You can certainly find quality diet pills made by good companies.