I don’t remember almost anything about the 12th. 🙃
It was crazy hot, with me dripping sweat I think within 5 minutes of being outside as I was squatting by the lawn mower trying to figure out what was wrong with it.
Gratefully, at least hopefully, I did figure it out. Looks like it has a bad voltage regulator and isn’t charging the battery. As best I can tell, the full 30 plus volts of alternating current is coming from the stator just fine, but the voltage regulator that also acts to change the AC current to direct current is only putting out about 2 to 4 volts instead of the 14ish it should be putting out.
The part is ordered. Cross your fingers that that’s what the issue is, as the grass/weeds is getting long. 🤞
Other than that, I think I veged out most of the day, But I don’t remember for sure. It’s a bit of a blur.
One pretty significant thing that I’ve been dealing with lately is how to handle what’s going on with my marketer. I’ve consulted an attorney and I’m trying to figure out everything.
As the story goes, 5 years ago, I was approached by a marketer offering to generate leads for my business. I call him a marketer, but It’s probably more accurate to say a lead generator.
Anyway, we agreed on a fee for his services, And I’ve been using his lead generating service for the last 5 years since. Overall, he’s done the very well, and I stay very busy much because of the marketing that he does for me.
The last two years, he’s been an absolute nightmare to deal with, though, And after it was too late, I realized that the arrangement was actually extremely lucrative for him and extremely destructive for me.
When he created the accounts that he was using to generate the leads for me, he didn’t use my business name. He created his own business names and addresses, and he forwarded people to me from those. That meant that when I got reviews, he was getting the reviews and not me. The reviews were going on his listings, building up his business, but not doing anything for me were I to ever leave him as a lead generator.
Basically, I became trapped because A huge portion of my business reputation is found in the reviews on the listings that he created. If I leave him, he will mark it to someone else, and whoevery markets to will get the benefit of five years of stellar business reviews without having had to lift a finger, and I will lose nearly everything.
Way back in the beginning, he promised me access to the listings, but he never gave it to me. He didn’t necessarily promise that they would be my listings, but he told me he was going to give me the password so I could respond to reviewers. Weather that meant he was going to transfer the listings to me or not was not talked about, though it’s clear now he had no intention of giving me control of the listings.
Anyway, over the last two years, he’s become nearly impossible to get a hold of, even when I’m in a bit of an emergency.
At one point, he took I think six months to get back to me When I was dealing with stuff that I was trying to get figured out and six right away. He was nowhere to be found.
I started doing some internet sleuthing to try and find him, but mostly what I could find were social media accounts that had been shut down for violations. When I communicated with at least one, maybe more of the companies that I thought he was connected with, I couldn’t find anyone who had heard of him.
Things were coming to a head because I’ve been having issues with getting bad reviews that I needed to take care of, and also one of the listings that he created actually used the address of another existing business, and that business was unhappy and communicating with me to try and get things fixed so that there wasn’t any confusion about businesses.
Eventually, I gave up trying to get ahold of him, and I clicked on the link in Google that says something like “Is this your business?” And it gives you the opportunity to claim it.
So i did.
And two out of the three listings that had been created were able to be transferred in Google to me.
So for the last however many months, I’ve actually been able to communicate with the people leaving reviews for me, and that’s been fantastic.
I let my lead generator know what I had done, but he never replied… Until a week or so ago when he accused me of stealing his listings.
I had told him exactly what was going on, and he had promised me access to them previously and never given it to me, so…
Then I started doing some more research, and I verified that the names that he was using for the business listings on Google that he had created we’re not legal business names at all. Neither actual business names nor DBA names.
I also learned that the listings he created were in violation of Google’s policies, as lead generating companies are not allowed to have Google business listings.
So not only was he using fake business names, with fake business addresses, in some cases using the actual business addresses of existing businesses, he was also in complete violation of Google business policies.
I consulted with an attorney, and the attorney let me know that not only was he clearly in violation of Google policies, but he may well also be guilty of fraud, as he was fronting a business and promising service that he himself and his business didn’t provide. I was the one doing the providing. My customers think they’re calling one company, but those calls all get forwarded to me, a different company altogether.
The attorney also said that because those Google listings were created with the intent of giving me leads, I could potentially claim them as mine anyway because they were created for me to get business.
Anyway, it’s been a big mess because on the one hand, he created the listings originally, so you could easily claim that they are his, but he also promised to give me access to the listings, which he never did. And there’s the fact that his listings are 100% against Google business policy, so they should have actually never been allowed to be created and should have been deleted by Google. Business listings for lead generating companies are one of the three business types that are strictly forbidden by Google business.
My lead generator simply managed to figure out a way to fly under the radar– not to mention that his business practices in addition to possibly being illegal and certainly against Google business policy, are also predatory and destructive. Any business that uses him, yes, they’ll get plenty of leads in the beginning, but then they are stuck with him after they don’t need him anymore. If they leave, then he just marks to someone else, and that’s someone else becomes an immediate major competitor without having to do the work of building the business reputation. So you’re stuck paying for something that you don’t need anymore. And if you walk away, it doesn’t only hurt you, it hurts all the other mobile mechanics as well because suddenly they all have another major competitor that didn’t even have to build from the ground up.
Super predatory business style.
Love and hugs. 😊
But all that aside, the main question, since apparently he has no legal claim to the listings, is whether or not it’s morally the okay for me to take them over.
The reviews are mine, with the exception of a few bad ones that were received when the lead generator decided, without telling me, to start generating leads for a direct competitor of mine who was covering the same area as I was. I realized what was happening only because I was getting bad reviews from customers who weren’t my customers. I confronted my lead generator, and he admitted what he was doing, and he stopped generating leads for the other guy. Other than a few of those, the reviews are mine.
And apparently, though the listings were created, ownership was never actually assumed because Google listed the business listings as available to be claimed.
It’s a sticky mess, morally. Or maybe my conscience is just overactive. He doesn’t have a leg to stand on policy wise and should have the listings deleted no matter for being in violation of Google listing policy. And he may well be perpetuating legal fraud, according to the attorney. It would need to be looked in to deeper to be sure… And he did promise to give me access to the listings and never did, but that doesn’t mean he promised to give me the listings.
Sticky, weird, mess. If you have any opinions on the matter, I welcome them in the comments. 😊
So anyway, that was my 12th. Nasty, hot, sweaty weather. Beating my head against the lawn mower until I finally figured out what was wrong with it, stressing out about and trying to figure out what to do about this issue with my lead generator, and vegging out to try and avoid, at least for a little while, directly having to face all the stresses.
Crazy times. 🙃
Lift the World
~ stephen
Lift the World 