Comments on: Lead Buyer Beware of Lists and Cheap Data

By: Sammy

Sammy — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 20:40:53 +0000

I prefer ripoff report because they are aggregated and easy to search. I haven’t been ripped off on leads yet, but I do get about 10-20 email solicitations for buying leads every day. every once in a while I check them out on ripoff reprot to see if they’re legit. There are tons of bad ones out there it seems! And, you have to wonder where they’re getting their names…

By: Bill Rice

Bill Rice — Tue, 27 May 2008 00:47:30 +0000

Alice,

Thanks for sharing your experience. In most, if not all of these scenarios, it is very difficult to get restitution. This is why it is so important to due reasonable due diligence before and certainly get documented–publicly–foul play.

I wish this was more uncommon. This was one of the primary motivations of this site–to provide due diligence, information, and accountability.

Thanks again for your comment.

Bill

By: alice

alice — Tue, 27 May 2008 00:21:57 +0000

We did get ripped off by a company called Elite Marketing in California. They promised us 40 leads for $900 which we had to pay up front wiht a check. We have been asking for our leads and received may be on 5 leads that were not even within the parameters of what was contracted. We complained to BBB and have had absolutely no luck. We have made numerous phone calls, pleads, begging, emails etc. to get what was promised and no response from the company at all. Do Not Use Them.

By: Bill Rice

Bill Rice — Thu, 22 May 2008 16:01:26 +0000

Mortgageboss-I tend to agree with you.

It is not a go/no go decision source, but I do use it as a data point in an environment where there is very little data on lead providers (one of the reasons I started Lead Marketwatch). I find the best way to use it is to look for a significant number of consistent complaint types. For example, in the case of the customer I cited above. I searched for the lead provider they mentioned and their were about 20 “cookie-cutter” complaints in the same vein of my clients’ complaint. My search also uncovered that they had multiple registrations with BBB with different addresses–making one profile squeaky clean and the other a D.

All in, I guess the message is do a little due diligence before you slap down a deposit.

Thanks for the comment!

By: Mortgageboss

Mortgageboss — Thu, 22 May 2008 15:40:47 +0000

Thanks for the information. I would, however, discount the BBB.

In my opinion, they are a professional extortion orginzation. They try to get you to join by saying “If youre not in, they people wont buy form you” or “we have had inquires about your company and have referred them to our members.” Furthermore, there are cases where they ignore or dont disclose complaints about member businesses.

Other than that, I dont have a strong opinion on the subject….