We had a company reach out to us last week that offered the strangest service I’ve come across yet. They offered to supply us with before and after pictures of weight loss from strangers to help sell Married to Keto. Sure, we have books and merchandise, but we’re not really into the “selling” side of keto. We came into this, and still hold the belief we are on the helping side of keto. I’ve seen many people use shady tactics, but this one takes the cake. (keto-friendly cake of course)
Our Before and After Pictures
The only before and after pictures we use are our own, and I’ve talked in detail about how we’re not even that comfortable with those. The thought of using strangers and laying claim that we helped get them there makes me feel gross.
I personally feel before and after pictures make people doubt what you do and how you got there. When you look at those pictures it instantly becomes about how you look. We have always believed that keto is about how you feel first and foremost. Fitting into smaller clothing and using a smaller mirror are just a nice bonus. If you want your results to stick, losing weight needs to be about improving your health, not your appearance.
Stranger’s Before and After Pictures
What this company pitched was we pay them $150.00 a month and they give us five unique sets of before and after pictures they scavenged from the web. They don’t guarantee how these strangers lost the weight, or if they even approve of a company using their likeness.
Imagine us putting up all these pictures of people we don’t know claiming that our book led to these results. We have no background, no names, no ages, no details at all. They won’t even guarantee that the photos aren’t doctored.
I have one word for all of this… SCAM! If we started doing this, we are simply scamming and stealing from you. Not our style. We believe in what we do and how we can help, but the argument that we are telling a little lie to help more people is just garbage. This would be lying to line our pockets.
Are There Other’s Doing This?
After going through this “companies” information my mind immediately went to the question? Are other’s doing this. Do any of my favorite keto and health sites use other people’s photos to show how good they are? It turns out they do.
I went onto some of the keto groups we use and did reverse image searches. The before and after pictures showed up in numerous places claimed by numerous websites as their own. To say I was disheartened is an understatement.
Some of the people I look up to for information have gone down this route. That just sucks.
This internet business thing is a tough road. It’s a lot of work with little payback when you first get started. I get that people who have invested the money and are trying to climb the mountain may feel they need to resort to these tactics to get where they need to be, but it’s not worth it.
Trust Issues
With my discovery I now have trust issues with some of the sites that help build my foundation in keto. I must wonder if they take these shortcuts in everything they do. Is there plight of weight loss even real, do they know as much as they lead us to believe, can I trust any of their information is their own?
We live in an age where the internet is getting harder and harder to navigate. When you find a source, you can rely on you tend to go back to that time and time again. When that source lets you down, how do you recover?
Before and After Picture Uses
I’ve recovered from this by using a life lesson I learned a long time ago and applying it to the situation. That lesson: take what you need and leave the rest behind. I’m still using these sources to a degree, but I refuse to acknowledge them publicly and I do even more research to back up anything I gained from them.
Some tidbits they have can still be useful to me as my personal journey grows and changes, but any pictures that go up will be treated as lies. As I said… take what you need and leave the rest behind.
Before and after pictures we’re motivational to me if I felt connected to the person. I knew that with that big of a change they must feel wonderful. Unfortunately looking at how the industry is going it appears I can’t really use that tool anymore.
It might be time to look in the mirror and use my own accomplishments as motivation. I’m going to take that and leave the rest of this SCAM behind.
Keto on friends. Bill
