Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been getting random orders of Tiny Epics: Vol. 1.
“What’s wrong with that?” I hear some say.
Well, while not abnormal, these orders have come from first-time customers who aren’t a part of the Legion.
That’s the first red flag.
Furthermore, when I inspected these orders, I was warned by the software running my Storehouse that these transactions were deemed “Medium to High” risk.
Are you starting to see why my nose twitched, Legionnaire?
I’ve long heard the dangers of selling low-priced wares online (especially those valued under $5-$7 USD) as it attracts fraudsters like bees to honey.
What typically happens is these scumbags — who have purchased personal information (like credit cards) leaked onto the dark web — buy low-priced goods online for two reasons:
- To test if the card works
- To avoid alerting the individual
If the card is a dud, they try another one.
If it does check out, then dinner’s on them until the bank freezes the card and reverts all fraudulent transactions in the form of a chargeback.
In this case, the fraudster wins while the customer and merchant (me) lose.
In one such case, an author received 50+ orders in a short space of time, and all of them ended up getting charged back weeks and months later.
The poor lass thought some kind soul had promoted her wares to their social circles and subsequently reinvested those profits back into the business, only to end up several hundred dollars in the hole after chargeback fees were applied.
Awful.
That’s why I’ve long forked over the dough to anti-bot, anti-fraud apps to help prevent these lowlives from wreaking such havoc in my Storehouse.
Some would consider it a major success to only have a few dodgy orders slip through the net, given how much marketing I’ve done this year, but I’m not any old author.
I am Overlord & Saviour.
I’m not merely happy with partial wins.
No, no.
I want to be as unattractive as a 90-year-old hooker to these scoundrels, and so, I’m not only increasing the security at my Storehouse, which may or may not block out anyone using a VPN, but I’m also strongly reconsidering the prices of my single titles.
If $5-$7 products are what draw these vultures in, I’d rather lose a few sales than incur the headaches they promise to bring.
Especially with what I’ve got planned this coming year.
Let’s wait and see what the rest of the year brings.
In any case, this email serves two purposes:
- Keep an eye out for any small transactions you don’t recognise (rife this time of the year).
- You can shop all of my titles before any potential price levy is deployed here:
https://www.djjwatsonstore.com
DJJW