Advertising Disclosures

Everything on this site that somebody paid for is labelled where it appears. This page says what each label means, who is paying, and what money cannot buy here.

The short version

Sponsored means a retailer's advertisement. It is not a business in this directory.
Featured means a listed business paid for that block. It is still a real supplier and it is still in the results below.
Nothing else on the page is paid for. The results, the rankings and the guides are not for sale.

What "Sponsored" means

A block marked Sponsored is an advertisement from an online retailer. The advertiser is not a business in this directory, has no federal supplier record here, and cannot buy its way into the listings or move within them.

Offer terms shown in the unit are the advertiser's, and we check them against the advertiser's own store before running them. If an offer stops working, tell us and we will pull it.

Crutches.com. An ordinary outbound link. CrutchDirectory has no commercial relationship with Crutches.com and earns nothing when you click it or buy from it. It runs because it is a useful answer for a reader who has decided to buy online, not because it pays.

As of today, CrutchDirectory earns nothing from any advertisement on this site. That is a statement about the current arrangements, not a promise about future ones, and this page changes in the same commit if it ever does.

What "Featured" means

A business listed in this directory can pay $50 a month for a featured block above its city's results. One business per city. How featured placement works.

Three things it cannot do, and each is checkable rather than promised:

It does not move anyone up the results. The block sits above the results list, outside it. The code that orders the results cannot read anything commercial and a build check fails if it ever does.
The featured business stays in the results below, in the position it earned. You can scroll down and see exactly where it ranks without the money.
It does not move anyone down or remove them. Nothing here is for sale that affects another business. Removal is free and only on request from the business.

The fee is flat and never varies with the calls, clicks or sales it produces. Every business in this directory bills Medicare, and a directory paid a share of the business it sends would have a reason to steer patients. Removing that reason is worth more than the extra revenue.

Affiliate links

Some links to online retailers may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Where that is the case the unit says so and the link is marked as sponsored to search engines. Today no link on this site earns a commission.

What is never for sale

A place in the directory. Listings come from the federal registry and are free.
A position in the results. The ranking rule is published, and it reads nothing commercial.
Removal of another business, or a change to what we say about one.
A review, a rating, or the order reviews appear in. Review policy.
Anything in the guides. No retailer has ever been given a mention in exchange for money.

If you think something here is unlabelled advertising

Tell us and we will fix it or explain it, whichever it turns out to need: hello@crutchdirectory.com. Being able to trust the labels is the only thing that makes the rest of the site worth reading.