Online reputation management starts with acknowledging the feedback you’re getting.
I’ve been doing some low-level ‘reputation-watching’ on Bartercard since I noticed someone arrived on our ‘mu:kaumedia site via a search on the term ‘bartercard blogs’. (I’d written a post about Bartercard a couple of weeks ago).
Half an hour of gentle research revealed quite a lot of strong criticism about Bartercard and plenty of business people warning others off. In that time, I encountered almost no positive word-of-mouth recommending it. There are one or two people on forums saying how it works for them but they are far outweighed by the criticism.
Aside from the pros and cons of the scheme, any business that charges an initial £750+ joining fee for benefits that are anything but guaranteed is a ‘hi-risk’ proposition and the first thing any sensible business will do when offered such a ‘hi-risk’ proposition is seek out their peers’ experience and opinion.
And of course, they’ll do this in business forums, online networking arenas, review sites and blogs – leaving a permanent trail of discussion and opinion that wasn’t there before and that is impossible to swamp, erase or obliterate.
Your online reputation is always just a form of feedback – and at its core is usually that same, old, time-honoured unheard, unacknowledged customer dissatisfaction.
I think what you describe is a problem for all businesses, and its an issue that is very time consuming to manage.
In response to the reputation for Bartercard, I want to voice some positives. I started out working for a company that used Bartercard, and I felt, it used it badly, this immediately put me in the negative experience category.
In recent times I have joined bartercard with my company Abazander, and I have to say my experience has been really positive. The whole point to bartercard, is that its about buying services that you or your business needs, and not worrying about the selling of your services, because selling your services is the Job of your bartercard account manager.
Mine is called Karen, and bless her she’s fantastic, I send her 2 or 3 emails a week, or call her up saying “I need to buy this or that” and sure enough she comes back with contacts of companies that can help me, and she introduces me too. When it comes to selling my products on Bartercard, I simply wait for those calls or emails that come in saying “Hi Karen at bartercard suggested I get in touch” Its effortless.
Why ? because we always keep the Bartercard account in debt, so the account managers are always looking to find us business, and every time they do we spend the income to develop our business.
Thats how we use it, and it works really well for us.
Rick, many thanks for the comment.
You’re right, it is time consuming but it can’t be ignored. Now more than ever, businesses need to find ways to attract genuine positive feedback to balance criticisms.
Blogs are one way of doing that and creating reasons to interact with past (happy) customers and getting them to post reviews / feedback is another.
Bartercar has been fantastic for us. weve used for over 3 years purchasing IT stuff, stationary, vehicle maintenance (servcing, tyes, repairs, bodywork) advertising, furniture, fantastic holidays far above what I could afford if I paid cash, architects, presents, house removals, solicitors, accountancy, food and drink, hotels…. need i go on… Bartercard has saved us a fortune…
Complete waste of Time and Money.
The Bartercard staff dealing with my account or completely useless. So far it has taken 3 weeks to get an answer to an email I sent them and I am still waiting for an answer.
Any business where you have to keep calling / emailing the sales team that are meant to be working for you shoudl be avoided. As a business owner I don’t have the time to keep calling my account manager and telling her to do her job. A job which I pay my monthly fee for.
Any business owner with any sense will avoid Bartercard.
Hi,
I’m based in Dubai, and Bartercard was the biggest mistake I’ve ever made since I opened up my own business 2 years ago. I have requested services several times. Either nobody at BC responds, they respond weeks later, or the contacts they give me refuse to accept barter (although they are members). Additionally, in my 2 years of membership with Bartercard, they have brought in 2 customers for me. EFFICIENT and BENEFICIAL is something else.
Today, I exploded on the phone with them. WASTE OF TIME, WASTE OF MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for your comments, Chris, Vicki, Omar
I’d be interested in how easy it was / is / isn’t for you to give this feedback to them?
And are they listening to this online? Since you guys arrived here, so could they. After all, you’d think it would be in their best interest.
Bartercard is a series of franchises, which is one reason why there is so much difference of opinion. Different teams will be more or less effective than others. Still, whatever the reasons for these different experiences, what is for sure is that Chris and Omar won’t be making warm recommendations for Bartercard.
If that was my company, I’d at least want to have some dialogue with them!
I have owned 4 businesses over the years with 7 years relationship with Bartercard as an owner operator. I joined in 1997 and finalised my account in 2004 . During this time Bartercard brought me extra business valued @ over $380 000, this doesn’t include the extra cash business from word of mouth (one particular BC sale of $3500 ended up generating 4x$3500 cash sales to their family and friends).. I closed my business down due to family reasons (workaholic doing 12hrs a day 7 days a week till my wife demanded lifestyle change or else). After some soul-searching I decided to work for Bartercard. I have to admit Bartercard it is not for everybody ,some people just don’t ‘Get it’.
As for trade Co-ordinaters (the person clients contact for purchasing and sales requests) There are those that are good and some that are bad ( I am located in an office with 3 of the best). I can assure everyone that is interested that without feedback to the Brokerage principal, Bad ones will continue to muddy our system. This goes for some of our clients/members as well. People sometimes join Bartercard simply to try and convert the Bartercard enquiry to a cash job, hence the “not taking Bartercard” scenario .Status Quo only continues while people do not communicate. Sometimes when a person fails, they will blame everyone but themselves for the failure, As in “I had too many Bartercard customers and not enough cash customers and couldn’t pay my rent, Bartercard sent me broke!!” I have heard this from a few people, mainly referring to a third party. The Australian average is over 50% of new business fails within the first 3 years.
Yes our online rep doesn’t appear that good but ,I can GUARANTEE that for every unhappy (ex)Bartercard member we have about 150 happy ones (totalling 75 000 members worldwide) ..
If you are not getting the service you should from your brokerage ,contact Bartercard International today through our website and lodge your complaint.. Yes we are listening.
If anyone is interestead in more info on bartercard my email is robert@bartercardsgc.com.au
Thanks for that, Robert.
Great point about communication, I agree with you on that. If you’re not getting barter business you need to talk to your broker about it and work with them.
It seems to me that getting what you need out of Bartercard requires the ability to communicate and the ability to be assertive to say what you need. Neither of those are exactly commonplace skills however – no fault of Bartercard’s, but instrumental nonetheless in people feeling it hasn’t worked for them.
In terms of reputation, good to see Bartercard’s listening. This blog demonstrates a basic ORM principle – that unhappy customers WILL fill the information vacuum for you if you’re not careful! If there are 150 happy customers to every 1 not-so-happy ones, however, maybe the real opportunity is doing more to showcase what really works for those happy ones?
If you use Bartercard wisely and have a product that’s easy to sell, doesn’t cost you cash and you can easily spend the dollars earned back into marketing, then Bartercard is perfect.
The Bartercard guy came around here (I’m a web designer) and tried to persuade me to join. I didn’t think it would do me any good – maybe I was wrong – I’ll never know. I was introduced by one of my clients who has since not been able to make the system work for him at all.
Hi,
My experience of bartercard trading for the past 6 years has been largely very positive. Let me summarize the benefits:
- It has brought in considerable new business
- Barter members have given me lots of cash paying referred business
- I have spent alot of money on holidays luxury items I couldnt afford in the cash world
And the main disadvantages:
- The vat man doesnt accept barter! – so barter sales cost me 17.5% cash deficit (currently 15%) plus the barter fee’s.
- It can be hard to find members willing to trade as alot of members fall out of love with the concept
Good summary Andy – thanks for that.
Bartercard didn’t work for me, I never used the service and after nearly three years I cancelled my membership this year. I have since been presented with an invoice for over £1100! I’m in touch with Bartercard at present trying to get this resolved – but I honestly can’t recommend them.
Dont do it. i used to work for them. this system only worked for 10% of the people.
I was one of the best account managers they had and i left because i couldn’t keep brain washing people to purchase poor quality goods there business didn’t need. if you can find 5-10 regular expenses at a good price, and some companies that will do business with you, then feel free to join. however i recommend calling them from the book before you do. allot of people don’t take the business due to timing and having too much trade.
don’t do it. focus on your cash business and growing that. your time will be wasted on researching quotes and prices.