Seek Social Omdömen 5

Total scam. Not only that, watch out for your children...these creepers text them too!

SeekSocial has been a great resource from the start of our business relationship. Thorough communication and helping to align the website with business goals has helped me throughout the years.

They rebuilt my business website from the ground up - it's attractive, clean and shows off my services well. Easy to navigate. They're very informed on SEO matters, helpful with WP maintenance. Always quick on email, very pleased. Good people.

I cannot stress enough how little professionality I found in this company.

Quick summary:

Today is the 28th of October 20220. Two months and 10 days have passed since the day we started working together (17th of August) and here is the current situation:
1. NO COMPLETED WORK has been provided yet (neither the one we established in the contract nor the one we agreed on verbally);
2. the initial project PLAN WAS NOT RESPECTED
3. the team I paid for is NOT there;
4. I cannot get hold of the recordings from the meetings;
5. my emails are being ignored.

The whole story:

In mid-August, I was contacted by this agency. They told me they would provide me with several services, including some copywriting work for my brand book and website, the formulation of a marketing strategy and 20 social media posts. The team was formed by a copywriter (Rochelle), a project manager (Sophie), and an SEO expert (Dean), which is also the founder.

23d of August: We had an onboarding call. Dean told me the work would be divided into 3 phases: phase 1. marketing strategy; phase 2: website and brand book; phase 3: social media posts. Each phase would last from 4 to 6 weeks.

2d of September: we had a meeting where the copywriter (Rochelle) explained the work I had to do to develop the tone of voice for my brand. In the following days, I completed the task by giving them all the information they needed. Rochelle was very helpful in answering my questions. She also provided me with some examples of different tones of voice. This helped me to complete the task at hand. (Thanks Rochelle!)

After this call, two meetings in total were cancelled (one because of the Queen’s death, another one with 1 hour's notice and with no justification).

Mid of September: Please note that no work has been produced at this point.

21st of September: we had finally a second meeting where Dean was on his own and presented my own notes from the task I completed! He simply COPIED AND PASTED them on a PowerPoint with the use of really poor graphics. He apologised for the quality of the work and reassured me that, since that moment, we could have started meeting once a week to make up for the time lost, and make progress faster.

28th of September: The following week, I showed up for the meeting that Dean promised the previous week, and guess what? Nobody showed up. I contacted the project manager (Sophie) and she told me she has no idea. I had no notice and no justification again until the next day

30th of September: At this point, after 3 cancelled meetings and no work completed, I sent them a performance email where I listed all the things I was unhappy with and remind them about the services that they agreed they would do, to check if we were still on the same page. In response, Dean claimed that, because our relationship changed, he now refuses to complete all the work that we agreed verbally and will only stick to what was in the contract.

4th of October: another meeting is scheduled for 2.30 pm. Dean does not show up until 2.40. He barely apologised, saying that he had another important meeting going on and that was not his fault. We spent 80% of the meeting arguing. He mentioned all the things he changed his mind about. He told me he would get rid of phase 2 (copywriting) and just do phases 1 (marketing strategy) and 3 (social media posts), and all the things we agreed on in a verbal agreement do not count anymore. After 30 min arguing, he showed me some work he started for phase 1 but, after 10 minutes of talking about it, he claims he has to leave. (note: instead of giving me extra time for the fact he came late, he wants to cut further time off the meeting).

6th of October: I asked for recordings that I would have needed for my solicitor, and he told me he has lost all of them.

13th of October: no updates, so I contacted them again, asking him about both recordings and the progress made. In response, he removes me from slack, saying that he did not do any work because he spent time trying to find my recordings (I still do not see how one would exclude the other, and he never explained this to me). He also told me that the project manager I hired (Sophie) will not work with us anymore. He has now become the project manager.

I am currently looking for a solicitor that would help me claim a refund for this and ask for all the damages and wasted time.

Conclusion:
Please be very careful with this company, especially if you are a start-up. Ask them to include everything in the contract, do not rely on verbal agreements and be extra clear about the services included, but do not pay all the phases in advance! Just wait for each phase to be completed and then pay them. Overall, I would not recommend it.