Article Marketer is in The Litter Box

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I didn’t want to have to do this because there are parts of the Article Marketer service that I really like. But, after numerous unsuccessful attempts to resolve 2 very basic technical support issues I’m putting Article Marketer in the Litter Box.

The Background

Article Marketer is an article syndication service. You create an account on their site (They offer free and paid accounts), upload original articles and Article Marketer sends them out to hundreds of article sites. The benefit of using a service like this is two-fold.

One, each article you submit contains an “About the Author” box which contains a link back to your site. So, it’s a pretty good way to build backlinks.

Two, since your content is syndicated all over the web it offers you good exposure and a chance to increase your audience. I actually have gotten some very good consulting clients from my article marketing efforts.

Article Marketer does a really good job of checking your article for proper formatting and content before submitting it to the article sites. And I really wish I could continue to use their service. It’s going to be hard to replace.

The Rub

Round 1: It all started several months ago when I hired Article Marketer to write some articles for me. (They do that too) I filled out the order form, paid via PayPal and waited for my articles. I had used them just a week before and was very pleased with the results. The second time however did not go so well. After the deadline passed and not hearing anything from them I submitted a support ticket. They answered the support ticket in a timely manner but their information was incorrect.

They claimed they had already delivered the articles to me and they resent me the files. But, the files they sent were the first set of articles they wrote the week before. They never delivered the second set. I tried to explain this to them in numerous support tickets but they never replied back. It was as if they weren’t getting my messages. I sent them the two different PayPal transaction ID’s but still no reply.

Finally, I decided to call them using the support number I found on my PayPal transaction. Which brings me to another point. Their support number is nowhere to be found on their web site. That should have been my first clue. Anyway, I called the number and got an answering service. The operator was somewhat friendly but not at all helpful. Article Marketer phone support consists of the operator filling out a support ticket for you. Well, I had already filled out 3 myself so what good is it for them to fill out another for me? At this point I had nothing to loose so I gave them all my info and they filled out the ticket for me.

To this day I have not heard back from them. I just wrote it off and decided to keep using their syndication service but vowed to never use their article writing service again.

Round 2: Two weeks ago I started an article marketing campaign in a new niche and I wanted to setup a separate account so I could have a unique author profile. I setup the account. Clicked on the upgrade button. Made the payment through PayPal. However, the payment I made has still not been applied to my account. My account is still in the very limited “Free” mode. Not to mention I’m out $100 and my article campaign has been stalled.

Again, I submitted a support ticket and again the initial response was surprisingly fast. I answered all of their questions, gave them all of my details and still two weeks and 5 support tickets later no response and the payment has not been credited to my account.

I understand what’s happening here and why they had a hard time linking my payment to my account. It’s because they use PayPal and base everything off of the PayPal email address. The account I created uses a different name and email address than my PayPal address. But I had to do that because I already have another account with that info. So, I get how and why they got confused.

What I don’t get however, is why they won’t work with me to resolve the problem. It’s a simple matter of administration and changing the email address on an account. It’s a simple matter of caring enough about your customer that you communicate and work with them to resolve their issue in a timely manner.

Unfortunately Article Marketer is incapable of doing either.

This time I only lost $100 and a week delay on my article marketing campaign. But, what if I would have taken them up on their $600 lifetime offer? I would be out some money and really pissed!

The bottom line here is this. If you’re going to do business online then TAKE CARE OF YOUR CUSTOMERS!

If you can’t do that then do us all a favor. Take down your web site and go and sell used cars or become a lawyer!

Finally, I hope someone from Article Marketer is monitoring Google Alerts, see’s this post and makes it right. Then and only then will I consider taking them out of the Litter Box.

Barry O.

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