It’s just over 17 hours until Mike Filsaime gives away the $1,997 Butterfly Marketing course and software and I’m contemplating whether to email my subscribers to remind them. I’m thinking that they might be sick of all the emails they’ve seen about it.

I’ve received various emails from people promoting it. Indeed, I’m promoting it myself, although hopefully without pushing it in your face. I’ve also received emails from someone who is launching a product that’s ‘similar’ to BFM. It’s similar in the sense that it handles product sales, affiliates, memberships – the whole shooting match.

The other product looks good. I intend to get a copy, if I can. I like to collect these things as much to learn from them as to use them and there’s always the chance that one of them will turn out to be the ideal fit for what you want to do. It’s like trying on several jackets to see which fit best and which look good…

The point of this post is to mention a pre-emptive tactic used by the other marketer. He clearly knows he’s up against BFM and he also knows that the whole word and his dog has been emailed about it. So he’s referred to it obliquely and his advertising emails ask his subscribers whether they’d rather buy something that’s a couple of years old (Butterfly Marketing), or something brand new for 2009 (his product).

Quite a provocative question, isn’t it? Which would you rather have? Something old, tired and with a catch, or something brand new with no catch?

That’s a marketing technique that’s as old as the hills. Ask a loaded question that can only be answered one way and guess which answer you’ll get? Everyone is going to prefer something without the catch.

The power of the question is in putting forward two views as if they are given facts. They’re not facts, they’re marketing speak. It’s interesting especially because this marketer is leveraging all the buzz about Butterfly Marketing to plant a little seed of doubt in his readers’ minds. Here’s an alternative way to look at the same ‘facts’:

Would you rather put your entire business in a script that’s brand new and ‘untested’ in the real world, or would you rather use a solid, mature product used by a host of top marketers every day to run their multi-million dollar businesses?

If the question was asked that way, what would be the more likely answer? Hmm, might be different than the other question.

If you take away anything from this post, please take away this: when somebody asks you a question and they’re trying to sell you something, the question is frequently loaded. Not always, but enough to make it important to ask yourself why that particular question is being asked.

Related posts:

1. Butterfly Marketing
2. Butterfly Marketing Campaign
3. Butterfly Marketing Meltdown
4. Delavo and Butterfly Marketing
5. Does Article Marketing Really Work?