Following a cold call, it took about 8 calls from the original rep and her manager to convince me to use their services; I succumbed after they assured me there was a moneyback guarrantee- i had nothing to lose...I should just give them a chance! Nana and Arbaz confirmed that if I wasn't happy I could cancel for a full refund within the 2 month trial, and even beyond that time since they guarranteed 30-50% increase in organic traffic. I called the phone reference they supplied who said Big Stone did fantastic work on his website. (Does he receive a kickback?) So, ultimately, I thought it was worth a shot, knowing if I wasn't satisfied, I I could cancel for the full refund.
To begin, they asked for keyword ideas explaining that they would research my website, the market, competitors, google, etc and create a high quality keyword list for me to approve. After about 6 weeks of getting nowwhere on the list and way too much of my time reviewing essentially the same garbage keyword list over and over, I called it quits.
I was told I could wait a little longer and see if it imporves but I decided not to waste any ore of my time or theirs. I told them to stop and refund my money in email and on the phone. I was cancelling and wanted a refund. Plain and to the point. I was asked if a manager could call me, and while I said it was fine, I assured them I wouldn't be changing my mind. Please send the refund.
No one called. Over the next few months, I continued to write or call and would always be thanked for my patience and told that they understood and we were waiting for the accounting department. I have to say that they have always been very nice and polite, but dealing with the ineptitude of the keyword creation and the lack of satisfaction with the the process and progress was extremely frustrating and it was costly in terms of the money outlayed and the huge waste of my time. I was paying for results and these were sorely lacking. And I had been guarranteed the 100% refund if I wasn't happy.
Here is a sample email (the 9th discussing the proposed keywords and their lack of progress.)
"I trust this email finds you well.
Let me start this email by saying that I am extremely sorry for all of the confusion that has happened till date. It is truly a fault at our end for which I have the deepest regrets. Trust me , to have a client as understanding as you is truly a blessing in disguise. As per our last discussion, please find attached the keywords analysis report which I sincerely hope will be the final one. Kindly go through the report and suggest a good time to get in touch with you so that we can have a discussion around it."
They did not satisfactorily complete what they promised NOR did they follow through on either the verbal assurance by their sales staff, nor the written guarantee on the website of the full refund. I have been awaiting a response by phone or email from their accounting department letting me know that there's been a series of confusions but that the $550 refund check would be arriving in a couple of days. Luckily, I have not been holding my breath or I would have died waiting.
I was approached by Divya Bahl of Bigstone, once I stupidly responded to their spam. They would be able to turn my online store around through the generation of special keywords and backlinks. Sounds fantastic, they will work with me and have a team dedicated. Whatsmore there was a special on. I should have heard the "but wait there's more" infomercial at this point in my head and seen reason. However I decided to hear them out and took a plunge parting with $300 for the first month to see what they could do. They also mentioned that they have experienced ex googe and yahoo experts and professional bloggers and writers who will create posts, using the keywords to generate more traffic and move my site up the rankings. Sounds promising so far. They request a list of keywords, I provide those. No these wont do, other people are using them, think of more, or different ones. They provide some suggestions, which is where I should have cut ties. Their suggestions would need to be typed into a keyboard by Rainman to generate a hit. Needless to say after 2 weeks of generating keywords back and forth we landed on some words to target. By this time the first month had ended. $300 value ? a list of 20 words/phrases.
Month 2 began with a bang, I was informed that the bloggers and writers were posting articles all over social media to drum up traffic and enforce the relevance of the backlinks and keywords. Interesting, I wasnt aware that they knew so much about the business that they could do that, so asked to see some of the blogs. Oh dear, someone has strung together a list of words into loose sentences which do reference products I have sold but to the wrong gender and with the wrong information. It is almost like there is a school somewhere in kindergarten and they have been given a list of words to stick on the wall - job done.
Month 3, email from customer asking how to purchase as my website is down. No orders can be filled. Upon contact with BigStone, they say they will spend some time looking into it and reveal during their setup of new pages, that they also upgraded wordpress. Which conflicted with some variables on the cart. Excellent work ! Meanwhile I start receiveing a few spam emails and comments to screen. 2 days later, its up to 200+ emails, by the end of the week +1400 emails with spam comments. Transpires that BigStone made a BigError and setup the pages open to commentary. I ask them to undo their "work" so that I can function at work without their new additions. They switch pages from public to private, so now its just the repeat spammers. Good Job BigStone. All the while the SEO traffic has not increased. The keywords that I picked, they dont like and arent drawing enough attention. The website is finally back up and running 3 weeks later, so missed sales revenue. The pages that they setup are all blank, despite the claims that they have experienced writers. Guess I should have realised this from reading the pigeon english on the blogs, that they would not be competent enough to wrote some content for pages. I 'll cut them some slack there, they asked me to write the pages. In which case, what have I paid for ? A 3 week Broken website; 5 private spammed blank pages for life; some backlinks, generating more spam than value.
Do yourself a favour take the money you would be asked to hand to them and donate it to charity. I have of course approached Kewal Chawla for reimbursement, only to be met with a constant "Help me to understand what you are complaining about" after repeating this above 3-4 times. When asked to speak to his supervisor, he asked to know what the problem was I would like to discuss. I suppose this isnt on a cheat sheet of Q&A on the switchboard to respond with.
BigStoneSEO.com Reviews
Following a cold call, it took about 8 calls from the original rep and her manager to convince me to use their services; I succumbed after they assured me there was a moneyback guarrantee- i had nothing to lose...I should just give them a chance! Nana and Arbaz confirmed that if I wasn't happy I could cancel for a full refund within the 2 month trial, and even beyond that time since they guarranteed 30-50% increase in organic traffic. I called the phone reference they supplied who said Big Stone did fantastic work on his website. (Does he receive a kickback?) So, ultimately, I thought it was worth a shot, knowing if I wasn't satisfied, I I could cancel for the full refund.
To begin, they asked for keyword ideas explaining that they would research my website, the market, competitors, google, etc and create a high quality keyword list for me to approve. After about 6 weeks of getting nowwhere on the list and way too much of my time reviewing essentially the same garbage keyword list over and over, I called it quits.
I was told I could wait a little longer and see if it imporves but I decided not to waste any ore of my time or theirs. I told them to stop and refund my money in email and on the phone. I was cancelling and wanted a refund. Plain and to the point. I was asked if a manager could call me, and while I said it was fine, I assured them I wouldn't be changing my mind. Please send the refund.
No one called. Over the next few months, I continued to write or call and would always be thanked for my patience and told that they understood and we were waiting for the accounting department. I have to say that they have always been very nice and polite, but dealing with the ineptitude of the keyword creation and the lack of satisfaction with the the process and progress was extremely frustrating and it was costly in terms of the money outlayed and the huge waste of my time. I was paying for results and these were sorely lacking. And I had been guarranteed the 100% refund if I wasn't happy.
Here is a sample email (the 9th discussing the proposed keywords and their lack of progress.)
"I trust this email finds you well.
Let me start this email by saying that I am extremely sorry for all of the confusion that has happened till date. It is truly a fault at our end for which I have the deepest regrets. Trust me , to have a client as understanding as you is truly a blessing in disguise. As per our last discussion, please find attached the keywords analysis report which I sincerely hope will be the final one. Kindly go through the report and suggest a good time to get in touch with you so that we can have a discussion around it."
They did not satisfactorily complete what they promised NOR did they follow through on either the verbal assurance by their sales staff, nor the written guarantee on the website of the full refund. I have been awaiting a response by phone or email from their accounting department letting me know that there's been a series of confusions but that the $550 refund check would be arriving in a couple of days. Luckily, I have not been holding my breath or I would have died waiting.
I was approached by Divya Bahl of Bigstone, once I stupidly responded to their spam. They would be able to turn my online store around through the generation of special keywords and backlinks. Sounds fantastic, they will work with me and have a team dedicated. Whatsmore there was a special on. I should have heard the "but wait there's more" infomercial at this point in my head and seen reason. However I decided to hear them out and took a plunge parting with $300 for the first month to see what they could do. They also mentioned that they have experienced ex googe and yahoo experts and professional bloggers and writers who will create posts, using the keywords to generate more traffic and move my site up the rankings. Sounds promising so far. They request a list of keywords, I provide those. No these wont do, other people are using them, think of more, or different ones. They provide some suggestions, which is where I should have cut ties. Their suggestions would need to be typed into a keyboard by Rainman to generate a hit. Needless to say after 2 weeks of generating keywords back and forth we landed on some words to target. By this time the first month had ended. $300 value ? a list of 20 words/phrases.
Month 2 began with a bang, I was informed that the bloggers and writers were posting articles all over social media to drum up traffic and enforce the relevance of the backlinks and keywords. Interesting, I wasnt aware that they knew so much about the business that they could do that, so asked to see some of the blogs. Oh dear, someone has strung together a list of words into loose sentences which do reference products I have sold but to the wrong gender and with the wrong information. It is almost like there is a school somewhere in kindergarten and they have been given a list of words to stick on the wall - job done.
Month 3, email from customer asking how to purchase as my website is down. No orders can be filled. Upon contact with BigStone, they say they will spend some time looking into it and reveal during their setup of new pages, that they also upgraded wordpress. Which conflicted with some variables on the cart. Excellent work ! Meanwhile I start receiveing a few spam emails and comments to screen. 2 days later, its up to 200+ emails, by the end of the week +1400 emails with spam comments. Transpires that BigStone made a BigError and setup the pages open to commentary. I ask them to undo their "work" so that I can function at work without their new additions. They switch pages from public to private, so now its just the repeat spammers. Good Job BigStone. All the while the SEO traffic has not increased. The keywords that I picked, they dont like and arent drawing enough attention. The website is finally back up and running 3 weeks later, so missed sales revenue. The pages that they setup are all blank, despite the claims that they have experienced writers. Guess I should have realised this from reading the pigeon english on the blogs, that they would not be competent enough to wrote some content for pages. I 'll cut them some slack there, they asked me to write the pages. In which case, what have I paid for ? A 3 week Broken website; 5 private spammed blank pages for life; some backlinks, generating more spam than value.
Do yourself a favour take the money you would be asked to hand to them and donate it to charity. I have of course approached Kewal Chawla for reimbursement, only to be met with a constant "Help me to understand what you are complaining about" after repeating this above 3-4 times. When asked to speak to his supervisor, he asked to know what the problem was I would like to discuss. I suppose this isnt on a cheat sheet of Q&A on the switchboard to respond with.