I have no doubts that this article is going to cause a lot of discussion. To be honest with you, as much as it burns me up when somebody steals my products and sells them illegally, I am very torn between going after these crooks and running my business. Ultimately, my main concern has to be putting food on the table. So that’s where this article comes in and asks the question…is the cost of fighting piracy worth it? We’re going to look for that answer together.

Let’s start off with a fact of Internet marketing…piracy is rampant. Just go to any site like Rapidshare and you will find more than your share of illegal downloads. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. On top of that, you have individual marketers uploading products to their own web space and selling them. It’s not a pretty picture.

Okay, so what do we do about this? Well, for starters, there’s just finding out about the piracy to begin with. To do that, you can create a few Google alerts to let you know of any sites that mention your name, your product name, or anything that can be associated with you. The problem with this is that if you have a lot of things out there that can legally be taken (such as articles) you’re going to be going through a lot of alerts each day. Still it can be done.

What about what happens AFTER you find all the offending sites? Well, if it’s a site like Rapidshare, you can contact them, let them know that the product up there can not be legally shared and for the most part, they’re pretty good about taking the links down. But what about private sites like Joe’s Web Store? In this case, you have to first contact them personally, to which you will usually receive a non reply. After you go that route, the next step is to contact their web host with a C & D.

Needless to say, all of this takes time unless you’re going to outsource the tasks. And then, if that’s the route you go, you’re spending money on something that is a non stop, never ending battle. As long as there are people out there, there will always be those who will steal your products. You will never totally put an end to it.

So ultimately, the question I’m asking is simple. Is it worth the time and expense to do this? How many sales will you have saved? Most people who download products illegally don’t use them anyway. So if they had no other way to buy them, they wouldn’t have bought them from you anyway. So what do you lose?

On the other hand, just throwing your arms up in the air and saying, “Oh well” is letting them win. And that’s not being responsible at all. That’s saying you condone the behavior or don’t care enough about it to do anything about it.

Is there a middle ground? Can you maybe dedicate just a small period of time each day to fight this problem? If you do that, are you doing it to really make a difference or is it just to prevent a guilty conscience from doing nothing?

If I’m getting too psychoanalytical with you, my apologies, but the truth is, this isn’t a simple cut and dried issue. Our time is limited and we have to decide if we’re going to spend it MAKING money or spend it preventing from LOSING money.

Believe it or not, there is a big difference between the two.

To Your Success,

Steven Wagenheim

Tired of getting your stuff stolen? Check out my review of the best digital protection software ever made at http://dlguardprotection.blogspot.com/2008/09/protecting-your-business-download.html and stop thieves dead in their tracks TODAY!