SEEK.NET?Anyone....?

[dee_liteful]

:confused::confused:Hi i need some advice:confused::confused:

I have just had a phone call from a lady who works for the company seek.net, they are an internet based advertisement agencey, who advertise in a magazine which can be found inside mags such as 'she' and 'cosmopolitin' they can be found through amazon, waterstones,tesco etc. She asked me to go on their site to have a look at their company and it all looks above board, its just that their cheapest advertisement costs £500! And i know it would be good but not sure how good. Has anyone had similar experiences or splashed out on advertising?

Shes says she came across my site after searching handmade handbags and after the 20th page of (not so good) sites she came across mine and realised they have no advertisements for my kind of work. After searching their site, i saw they do have bags but not handmade. Please someone help! I am pretty skint so its a gamble! Although i would feature in their christmas catalogue 1st and each one after for the year. It's very tempting to get my name out there....x

[beadsbydesign]

run a mile!
These things are never what they seem.
if you search for Aspire magazine on the forum you'll see the sort of thing.

[0103media]

My advice is ignore all phone calls and emails from any company asking for money..

If you wish to advertise somewhere then do some reasearch and find what best for you...

Try google adwords if you have a small budget but please never consider those spammy calls..

I get loads.. I've even had threats from competing SEO companies saying that they would hurts rankings if I didn't pay them.... Just ignore them..

[woodtattoos]

I agree with MrM... if you want to advertise somewhere, find it yourself and do all the research first. You would know what you wanted from such an outlay and therefore you would want it to go to an avenue that you trusted, not an unknown quantity. If they are cold-calling you, I'm sure it would be a fair guess to say that they may not be the most desirable or popular place going. Just my tuppenceworth... and this goes for all advertising in general, not just my opinion on the organisation that contacted you.

Si.

[dee_liteful]

thanks guys, thought it was a good idea to ask you lot first!!!will run far far away!x

[0103media]

I little 5 second reasearch on said company and someone wrote this

I think a company that can ignore 5 emails, 2 recorded delivery letters and a County Court Judgement is hardly a reputable company.quote is not writen by me and taken from a 1st page result from google.com legal side this can only be take as a opinion of someone on another forum and has nothing to do with this forum or my own opinions of said company..

[nattynetty]

I've had them on the phone before and they do quite a hard sell but take everyone's advice and avoid.

Talking of Aspire magazine I had someone from 'Just for Her' magazine call me this week, same sales technique as Aspire down to the letter. Difference here was that this magazine goes out to all female armed forces personnel and wives etc - so 'of course' I've never heard of it. When I said I'd like to talk to some of my friends in the forces to get their opinion on it all of a sudden the copy deadline was now and I needed to make a decision there and then! Hmmm that'll be a no then. If anyone here is in the forces and can confirm it does exist I'd be very interested to know.

[dee_liteful]

Oh dear oh dear!!!I think best to approach larger companies myself if i'm gonna part with that kinda money! I had a look at the threads on aspire- that is so scary! I have also receivd emails and phonecalls from someone who puts ads in the guardian and telegraph, also getting excited at first... but then talking to my dad decided to go against! It's really bad when their websites seem all professional but the reality is theyre all con merchants!!!I think i will be avoiding unknown numbers from now on......

[beadsbydesign]

in reality they target small businesses and then flatter. They hope you are inexperienced etc.

Large magazine publications etc still do the hard sell once you've had one add. they keep phoning and phoning. They've all got special features that would really suit your company.
A good hint when placeing adds is to never settle for the first price they quote you for. i've had ads in some really big publications where to start with they quoted nearly £300 and in the end gave me the ad space for £50!

[0103media]

I wouldn't say its a con in anyway or form..

The best return on investment takes a lot of work and reasearch.. This is the world I live in and work in ...

[jjghost]

very interesting - avoid it as it turns out to be a bit of a bad deal with seek.net

we advertised after being hounded, they dropped the price from 3k to £450
I know I shouldnt have been that stupid but they had rung over 30 times, hassled my then staff and I was really tired when the call got put through to me

turns out we didnt get a single bit of business & they also got my advert very wrong. tried to not pay but they then started calling twice daily - asking staff if we were going bust and telling them in a sneaky way that they were going to bankrupt the firm for non payment, despite them getting the telephone number of the ad wrong

I actaully closed down that biz and retired but hear so many other stories very similar in a my part time role as a biz adviser.
I have also had trading standards on the phone since as they are investigating seek.
before taking an advert - which they will totally over sell do a good web search, spend a few quid on checking the company and see how many firms the directors have had before in similar guises


I do advise my clients to call other advertisers in the seek.net books just to check the results. make your own mind up & dont be intimidated

jj

[Bath-Bomb.Com]

I parted with about £450 a couple of years ago and got into a couple of their little books - I think when you first start out in business you are a it naive about telemarketing of this kind and I think you do fall for the flattery.

I'd agree with all the other posters and say if you have some money to spend on marketing then do ome research and choose your magazine (or whatever) carefully - and don't be influenced by people who are paid commision to sell you advertising space.

Another tip for advertising that costs nothing is to get a nice A5 press release or flyer printed - find out the names of some editorial staff at some of the magazines that might have readers interested in your product and just post some samples and your flyer out to some editors. Or contact your local paper and ask if they want to do a little piece on your craft business.

You'd be amazed how much free publicity you can garner from that sort of thing.

[urbtaf]

As a warning on net adverts, in the early days of the net we had a site that always appeared on the 5th page or worse, then a company approached us and promised the first page every time! cost a small fortune but we appeared top of every search, for about 2 weeks, then we started to drop down again, when I contacted them it was a case of "if you want to pay again" I didnt
These people were selling the service to everyone, and everyone cant appear top every time.
Having stopped paying for fancy ads. I can say im pretty sure Im not loseing out
I target locals, direct my efforts to the people who may be interested. I dont have a big budget that I can offset against tax
And as has been said approach the local paper as a human intrest story. cards in shop windows, local notice boards, work well and its cheap

[fab4dave]

Please please anyone and everyone do not advertise with seek.net. I am currently trying to get these people stopped from trading. This company are a disgrace to the advertising industry. They are owned by Sami Muduroglu, a guy who (according to the internet) is currently a disqualified, undisharged bankrupt! You can see this proof if you google him in or go on the insolvency service website. His other two brothers Alper and Eren are trying to use bully boy tactics and are so desperate that they are taking people to court for allegedly not paying for ads in their directories. these are ads that they printed without customers approvaletc. I paid nearly £1000.00 for a full page ad in the weddings guide and it was then printed with no telephone number on it and a website address that is not mine, so the ad was in effect useless. I only discovered this about six months after starting monthly payments (which i am now claiming back in court) when i received a copy of the guide in the post and saw the cock up. I stopped the payments immediately and then they started hassling me for the money, they even threatened my 8 year old on the telephone! I have cd recordings of some of their "pay up or else" calls. Bromley trading standards want to hear about complaints against them so if you have had any problems then contact officer Bob Gilhom on 0208 313 4721. please read my full report on ripoffreport.com. and read some on the complaints board website. Alper muduroglu also reckons no one has contacted him to complain etc. which is rubbish. There are loads of people who are having the same problems, so if you are one of them, get involved to help to stop these people. None of this is libelist - it is all based on facts. The company try and sell you these guide books by saying they are stocked at tills in every tesco, sainsburys, whsmiths, borders (borders warehouse don't even have records of them on the system!) etc. but the only place you will find them is on amazon in bargain bins for 10 pence! Seek.net try and come across as a big company etc., but according to bromley trading standards, they are based above a takeaway shop or something like that! Please please report them today - it will only take you a minute and save lots of other people from being ripped off.

[dee_liteful]

OOO-ER!!! That is not good, i am so glad i didn't go any further with that. I will try to report them too. I have also has a phone call from a magazin called 'scarlet magazine' anyone heard? Did a quick search, but I think I will just phone up local papers etc as advised! Thanks for all your feedback i hope this helps other people should they get any dodgy phonecalls!

[silvermaid]

I think one of the first things you have do is to ask yourself are questions like
If I were looking for hand-crafted items where would I look?'
Have I ever heard of these publications or seen any in the shops?
Does it seem too good to be true?
Can I afford to spend that amount of money and how many sales would I have to make to get it back plus profit?
What advertising could I get for the same amount elsewhere?
Check out other places you could advertise - they may not be as expensive as you think.
And definitely do a web search to see if anyone has posted anything negative - or positive - about these people.


Melanie