Writer Wrangler

Kill the Custom Sample Scam Zombie

By Writer Wrangler Writer
 Li’l Herbert Fuchida

Never, ever give a client a custom “sample”. Period.

Scams are like zombies. No matter how much you beat them up, no matter how many limbs you sever, no matter how many times you empty a revolver into their chest cavity… They just keep on going! If you want to transform the undead back into the regular dead, you gotta take off their heads.

And that’s what I’m going to try to do today. I want to take a long-running scam that chews up writers like a zombie chews up brains and rip its head off. In that spirit, let me repeat the first line of this post:

Never, ever give a client a custom “sample”. Period.

Just in case you’re not familiar with this particular monster, here’s how it works: You respond to an ad seeking writers or a potential client contacts you. They have a job and they seem interested in hiring you, but they want to make sure you can handle their specific assignment.

So, they ask you to cook up a sample article that meets the project’s specs. The sample is a prerequisite to getting the job. You might get paid for it if the client hires you, but there’s no guarantee that you’re going to win the gig.

Here’s the scammy part: You’re not going to get the job. No one is going to get the job. The job is going to be completed using “samples” provided by all of the various “applicants”. The client won’t be spending a dime to get the material he or she needs. A slew of folks who are willing to produce a freebie in the hopes of winning a nonexistent position are doing all of the work.

Next thing you know, the jackass scamster has a site filled with brand spanking new and completely free content.

There is a variation on this scam. Sometimes one writer might actually get more work, but everyone else will still get screwed. Oh, and it usually turns out to be a much less lucrative opportunity than advertised.

And don’t think that this rip-off technique is unique to webmasters who wade in the shallow end of the writing market, either. Even the big boys are capable of asking for custom material, keeping all of the rights to it, and not giving you a penny for its use. Katharine Swann shows how Colgate-Palmolive has ran a slightly more elegant version of this scam. It’s dressed up more nicely when the major corporations are in charge, but it’s the same “giving it away for nothing” screw job.

The “custom sample” scam has been around for a long time. It’s made top ten and warning lists in the past. Still, like a George Romero creation, it keeps on stumbling along, laying waste to the good souls who don’t know how to send it back into the grave.

Cut this zombie’s head off, people. Don’t write custom “samples” and don’t give away any of the rights to your work unless you are properly paid for them. It’s easier than whacking off a zombie’s noggin with a lawnmower blade and just as effective in terms of producing the desired mortality.

Sing it with me one more time:

Never, ever give a client a custom “sample”. Period.

 

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