"HEY PERRY - WHAT'S THE STORY?"

 

A Trip Inside Some Rather SERIOUS Market Performance Problems

 

 

Friday, September 25, 2009

 

OK - it's venting time!

 

You may of heard of Perry Marshall - one of the biggies in the world of online info marketing.

 

He put out a new eBook recently - the 2010 Definitive Guide to PPC Google Ads.

 

It sounded great - so I bought. Or rather, I thought I bought!

 

Filled in all the blanks on the order form. Sent it off.

 

Got my confirmation email.

 

Tried to get the product… no luck.

 

Went back to the email. Tried again through the link they sent.

 

Again - no luck. The system found my email address but… couldn't find a corresponding purchase. This AFTER I received the confirmation invoice from Perry Marshall.

 

I then filled out a support ticket.

 

Got a confirmation from the support team - with a password to login and see the status of my request.

 

I tried logging in to see the status of my request. Guess what… YEP! You guessed it… I couldn't.

 

I got an error message telling me I didn't have the right permissions to access the page.

 

I tried yet again - and yet again got the same message.

 

I tried calling the telephone number on the invoice. Now, here's your second guess… could I speak to a live person?

 

RIGHT AGAIN!

 

Nope - I couldn't. Just a perky female voice telling me to leave a message and by the way… try using our online support form.

 

24 hours later, I could login to see my support ticket information - but no reply.

 

I filled out an update to the ticket. Then I noticed they have my name listed as J**** St. C**** - even though previously they listed it under my corporate name. Yes, I sometimes use the name J**** as a pen name, but NOT for this purchase.

 

SO PERRY, WHAT'S THE STORY?

 

You're supposed to be an online guru - right?

 

Then why can't your company process a simple order without your customer going crazy trying to find out why the damn system doesn't work? And why can't you even answer a simple email request?

 

Did you even test the entire buying process yourself BEFORE throwing up your email & web promos?

 

This is the internet - where instant download means NOW - not by and by whenever we can figure out what the Hades went wrong.

 

It's things like these that make me question anyone claiming to be an online expert. If you can't even get your own house in order - how good could anything you sell really be?

ADDENDUM: I sent them a last "support" notice demanding they get me acess to what I bought by 3:00 PM EST Sept. 25th. And the response?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. NADA. THE BIG ZIPPO!

I gotta tell ya, I'll be John-Browned and Carrie-Nationed before I buy another thing from good ole' Perry.

ADDENDUM 2: I got a email blast from Mr. Marshall concerning an online interview with another marketing whiz. Scratching my head as to why I was receiving this, I went to Perry's website and then saw an online chat feature - which I used. I laid out my claims about their miserable response to my inquiries with their online chat representative. Lo and Behold! Action was taken. A phone call was received. A refund was issued. An apology was given.

What happened? I was told it was a system error affecting 100's of orders. This only goes to underscore what I've been saying time and time again: TEST YOUR ORDERING SYSTEM YOURSELF! BEFORE YOU LAUNCH!

If not, you can end up trying to regain lost trust and making refunds that should never have occurred in the 1st place.

But in any event, thanks Perry for finally getting things straight.

ADDENDUM 3: WHOOPS! I SPOKE TOO SOON!

The very courteous rep who called me last evening also gave me a download link for the program. Great! Only one thing - when I tried to actually get the file - no dice. All I continually got was an error message: "The file is damaged and can not be repaired"

Perry, my man - you do have some VERY SERIOUS deliverability issues. A suggestion: Stop whatever promos you have going and fix your infrastructure. These comedy of errors are looking more like a tragedy every passing minute.

LAST (& FINAL) UPDATE:

I found out what was happening. If a customer tries to download the product via Firefox, it will fail. But using MS Explorer is OK. Again, gentle reader, the lesson is simple:

TEST EVERYTHING YOURSELF!

The sales you save will be your own.