What happens if you can't fulfill a guarantee — have you ever had to refund or not charge, and what do you do if the issue is with a different process?
Well, you give them a refund. You give them all of their money back and then potentially even more — maybe you buy them a $200 Amazon gift card to the steakhouse of their choice, whatever it is. The reality is if you cannot hit the constraints of your offer and you cannot deliver on that guarantee, you must make it 100% money back or risk-averse or whatever. It cannot have cost them anything to have engaged in this offer with you. Why? Because that is the core part of what makes a good offer. People need to feel totally comfortable. They need to see it on both a logical and emotional basis as being a 100% win for them. All roads need to lead to some sort of success — whether or not it works for them, they need to basically walk away with more than they got when they started. That is simply the reality of marketing in the current year. The point I'm making here is you should not be having to give a refund on 100% of deals — if you have to give a refund on 100% of deals, you're just not very good at the service. But even if you are not good at the service and you have to give a refund on 100% of deals, that's very useful information, and you'll also have learned a lot about how to do the sorts of deals we're talking about simply by going through this process. So if you look at the two universes — one where you did the refund and one where you did not — which one would make you better? The one where you did the refund. Therefore, you should do more of the refunds.
I always do. A guarantee isn't just promising I'll do X; it's not promising I'll make you $50,000. In offer terms, a guarantee is: I guarantee you I'll make you $50,000, or I'll give you all your money back and then give you a $250 gift card to the restaurant of your choice. That's what I consider a guarantee. Many people worry when they start a new industry and someone like me says you should guarantee stuff, thinking they can't guarantee because they're not good at it. The reality is, if you don't have a guarantee in your offer, you're leaving about three times the top of the funnel on the table, according to my math, maybe more, at the cost of maybe 5% of your margin, because your refund rate will be much lower than you think. Assuming a 5% refund rate, mathematically you get 3x top line for a 5% reduction in bottom line. Doing the math, that's 285% of the money you'd otherwise make without a guarantee. Meaning it's illogical not to include a guarantee. I also think guarantees make you work harder from a motivational perspective. If you compare two universes—one where you offer a guarantee to a customer and one where you don't—you'll work harder in the universe with the guarantee, because you're personally incentivized to perform. So there's really no reason not to do a guarantee; it's better for you and better for the client, who gets better results. It is immoral not to guarantee your services—that's my takeaway.
I use a guarantee very commonly in cold email and other marketing methods — I'll guarantee X result in Y time or you don't pay. It's not exactly true if you take it super literally, since at some point in time they will have paid, but the framing is short and fits nicely above the fold of the copy. When somebody actually gets on the call, I clarify it's a money-back guarantee: if by the time I said I'd achieve the results I haven't, they end up in the same state they started in — the state where they didn't pay. I haven't had many problems with this, but I'm also experienced at explaining the mechanics — I've heard of situations where less experienced people run a similar offer, get on a call, the prospect asks how it works, and they fumble the explanation ('well, you pay me and then later I give you your money back'), which doesn't match what the email implied. So it comes down to skill in framing it live: I'm happy to front-load the opportunity, get people on a call, showcase a ton of value, and let them arrive at trusting me based on my YouTube, Google presence, etc. — results may vary based on how well you can do that yourself. If you don't want to run the exact same offer, you can just change the language at the end from 'or you don't pay' to 'or I'll give you all your money back' — and nowadays I wouldn't even recommend a plain refund, I'd add something extra on top, like 'or I'll give you your money back and get you a night at your favorite steakhouse.' When you do that and actually mean it, it massively increases your top-of-funnel — maybe 300% more people through the door — and the cost is just a 5-10% refund rate plus a small bonus, which is nothing compared to the volume gained.
You should create an offer. The offer should look like: I will guarantee you X outcome in Y time, or I'll give you Z. Z could be your money back, a $250 Amazon gift card to your favorite steakhouse, or whatever you want. Basically, it needs to completely eliminate risk for them accepting the offer. Then you look and see if the business you're on a call with can actually achieve what you just said. If they don't have a good sales team and you're guaranteeing revenue, their ability to close that revenue depends on their sales team, meaning they won't be able to help you fulfill your guarantee, so you probably shouldn't work with them. As Hormosi said, virtually all sales calls are just verifying eligibility for the guarantee. When you run offers like this, you're literally on the call to see if your guarantee—say, booking them 20 sales appointments in 60 days or they don't pay—is something this company can actually deliver. You use the guarantee to get them on a call, then verify their eligibility. Some will say, 'Fuck yeah, we can totally do it.' Others won't look capable or competent; in those cases, you don't move forward because you know it's your ass on the line at the end of the day.
Offering guarantees makes you work harder and learn more because your ass is on the line. As Jack Roberts said, show me the incentive and I’ll show you the outcome. If you guarantee a result and must refund if you fail, you’ll push harder than if you just take money without a guarantee. You’re not just promising a result; you’re creating an offer like “I’ll get you 20 book meetings in 60 days or I’ll refund you.” That’s how it works. I was once told never to guarantee anything, which held me back, but now I believe you should 100% guarantee—it’s the minimum entry ticket these days.