No-one will really know they are false. It maybe not right in a sense because it is misleading consumers, but, even big cooperations do it. That's what advertising is all about!
Last year I signed up with a program that paid you to write things about products.... there were disclosure issues, it went to court I think and it turned out that it had to be revealed that we were paid to say what we were saying about the product. But you're right! How do you actually "know" it's paid?
if making a commercial with fake doctors isn't getting people in trouble, then i'm pretty sure fake testi's won't either. besides, you'd have to go to lengths to prove they weren't real.
I don't think it is legal, but ethically it is wrong. When I had a hosting company, I worked hard to achieve good reviews, and then some one day old company posts a paid testimonial - discgraceful!
Nobody will be sent to prison for it but its misleading so it could get a company into legal problems if their service isn't as good as their testimonials claim to be.
If you're thinking about it for your own services / product, why not offer your services at a discount to a couple of people in return for them providing feedback, and use that as a testimonial? That way you don't have to 'lie' to customers like that.
Yes. There is no real way of proving otherwise. But. if your product is any good, you won't need fake testimonials. Ask your clients, they will probably create a testimonial much better than one you make up!
All the sites seem to use them... Do you have a factual basis for this arguement? I am sure that there are a number of sites have false testimonials out there, but just because a site has testimonials does not mean they are false testimonials. But are they actually legal? If a testimonial is false and it is not disclosed as such then it is illegal. This is covered by the Fair Trade Act. Check out the FTC website (http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/guides/guides.shtm) for more information about it. How would they ever know? It is not as hard as it seems. The FTC is probably not looking around at small sites in their spare time. However, if you are in an industry where they decide to crack down (say dietary supplements) or a competitor reports you on the hope that you will get into trouble then you will need to substantiate where the testimonials came from.