History Main / ResultsNotTypical

!This trope is [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16721833000.53540600 under discussion]] in the Administrivia/TropeRepairShop.
Part of an UnreadableDisclaimer on many commercials that seem to be promising a lot and asking for not much in return, "results not typical" is an indication that the deal being advertised is ''probably'' not as good as it sounds. Often, you may have to do a lot more work than the ad promises, you may have to pay hidden fees, and indeed, [[LuckBasedMission you may just have to be lucky]]. As you can probably tell, this is a way of getting around truth-in-advertising laws; legitimate items with a risk attached to them, like securities, will tell you in great detail what you're getting into, and won't try to sugar-coat things too much.

Before the late 1990s, this was almost entirely specific to commercials for diet products. An ecstatic (and genuine) customer endorses the product by proudly stating "I lost 60 pounds!" What you're not told is that this particular customer was a fanatic about losing weight and pushed herself far harder than the average schlump would, thus losing twice or more what the plan or product really promises. The UK equivalent is "As part of a calorie controlled diet"; this is occasionally spoken by a reassuring female voice, but not usually. Since then, it's shown up on just about anything where the product may not work as advertised or where you may lose money, such as "make money fast" schemes involving the stock market or real estate, multi-level marketing systems, and "penny auction" websites that charge a small fee per-bid.

Disturbingly, it's even appeared in commercials for a chain of private cancer clinics. The implication is, despite the heartwarming, soft-focus testimonial from the patient other doctors had given up on, most people told they have fatal cancer will, in fact, die from it -- but give us your money anyway!

A variant of this that used to appear in car ads in the US was "Your mileage may vary" (which, by the way, was the TropeNamer for our own YMMV tabs). It was downplayed in TheNineties, when people stopped caring about gas mileage, but it's back now, in the [[ReadTheFinePrint fine print]] about which specific EPA mileage tests were used and how it might not reflect your driving habits (often with a link to fueleconomy.gov, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the US EPA's repository of fuel economy information]]).

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<<|CommercialsTropes|>>

Almost entirely specific to commercials for diet products, this is the usual UnreadableDisclaimer shown at the bottom of the screen when an ecstatic (and genuine) customer endorses the product by proudly stating "I lost 60 pounds!" What you're not told is that this particular customer was a fanatic about losing weight and pushed herself far harder than the average schlump would, thus losing twice or more what the plan or product really promises. The UK equivalent is "As part of a calorie controlled diet"; this is occasionally spoken by a reassuring female voice, but not usually.

This is also a part of infomercials touting real estate or stock market tricks. As satisfied customers testify to the massive amounts of money they made in ridiculously short periods of time, this disclaimer would be shown under them in virtually unreadable small print.

Also a staple of commercials advertising "multi-level marketing" pyramid schemes. Obviously a few people at the top of the pyramid will profit from "working at home", but the vast majority will lose most if not all of their investment.

Car ads used to say "Your mileage (fuel consumption) may vary", until people stopped caring about gas mileage in TheNineties. It's back now, in the [[ReadTheFinePrint fine print]] about which specific EPA mileage tests were used and how it might not reflect your driving habits.