EightPM

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We're an e-commerce company, specializing in LED light-up toys, novelties, party supplies and decor. I am the founder of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire EightPM?

To manage Facebook ad campaigns.

What were your goals for this project?

Achieve and maintain a positive ROI on ad spend wile obtaining new customers.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Ranksharks dba EightPM cold-called me and and sold their services over a period of one or two months hard sell cycle.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

I contracted Ranksharks starting Sept 27, 2018 for their promises to create and manage two Facebook marketing campaigns, (one acquisition and one retargeting.) They “analyzed” the existing account and listened to my cries about achieving a positive ROI and insisted that they were the experts to make these efforts go right.

The services that they were supposed to provide, per our contract, was NOT to provide a monthly "how are you" email or pretty graphs or meaningless reports, but specifically to actively manage TWO (2) Facebook advertising campaigns, with the overall goal of maintaining at least a "3 ACOS", (sales resulting from the advertising efforts being at least three (3) times that of ad-spend,) which is roughly the merchant's breakeven point, (before accounting for service fees.)

What was the team composition?

There were one or two people at the company that I was able to speak with. I am not sure of the specifics.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

EightPM (formerly Ranksharks Inc) is a scammer. They rely on the fact that small merchants are either too busy to stay on top of and continuously monitor their services, or simply do not have enough knowledge to do so. They milk hard working small businesses out of tens of thousands of dollars in management fees and wasted ad spend.

Managing the ads requires frequent modifications to the ads and to the targeting. According to the Facebook change logs in April 2020, they had not even touched the account in months, and have made only a few minor changes, (not of any consequence,) within the past year.

As a result, the ACOS was just under 1, (meaning that the ad spend was slightly more than the dollar value of the resulting sales - $7,261 spent on ads; $7,250 in resulting sales, not accounting for cancellations and returns; plus over $5,000 in service fees charged.

While it is on me that I was not monitoring their activities and did not catch onto their scam earlier, the bottom line is: Ranksharks/EightPM have NOT provided any of the services promised. They set up the ads, performed some ad management over the first few months, then completely abandoned the account, milking me for the service fees.

Furthermore, (while they were calling me on regular basis during the sales and onboarding process,) they did not bother to pick up the phone once in over a year to call me and discuss the degrading state of the abandoned account. These guys are nothing more by scammers! Petty crooks! Stay away!

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Not effective at all. They send a monthly standardized email and you have to request to schedule a meeting to speak to them.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their sales skills.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Yes, they should be shut down.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the general manager for Wings Air Helicopters, a New York based helicopter operator. We offer a number of different helicopter services from private charter to site seeing, flight instruction, aerial photography, travel experiences, etc.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Ranksharks?

We’re in a competitive business and Ranksharks was brought on to improve our SEO and Google rankings. They also to handle our social media and blog content.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They offer a solution to many of our IT issues. They built and designed our site. They do SEO work in the backend. They create the content for the weekly blog posts and the social media posts, on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+. In the summer, we have a higher budget and so it a larger amount of posts and more frequency. They send me everything for review once a week, and once I approve it, they take care of it from there. 

The only thing they don’t handle is our AdWords campaign. Maybe down the line, we’ll give it to them. 

How did you come to work with Ranksharks?

We were not happy with our previous provider. Ranksharks approached us and made a good impression. One of the reasons why we liked them is because they’re a small business like us and understand the challenges that go with that. The previous company was very large and it felt like we were one in a thousand clients. We didn’t get the personalized attention and service that we wanted. 

The way they presented themselves and their services was impressive, and their pricing was competitive. I met with only one other company, so we didn’t have a bunch of companies in the pool. We just wanted a few good ones to look at and go from there. Ranksharks really worked for it and we’ve been with them for several years now and are happy.

How much have you invested with them?

Our monthly budget was between $3,000-$4500 depending on the time of year. They are very patient with us as a seasonal business. In the low season, we reduce the budget and activity. They took the time to revise the marketing plans according to that and then switch it up again in the summer. They’re nice people to deal with and accommodate our business. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in December 2014 and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

Since Ranksharks started, we have 422% more unique users, 333% more page views, and roughly 160% more traffic. Organic and direct traffic have both more than doubled. People love our website, which was also built by Ranksharks. I’ve heard multiple clients raving about how nice it is and that it’s easy to navigate.

How did Ranksharks perform from a project management standpoint?

As far as reporting goes, we have a good system. We have monthly review calls and reports.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re a small company and we have a dedicated account manager who responds in a timely manner, which is not the case with other companies we tried. The quality of work is good, but their main strength is the personalized attention they give. If I ask a question, sometimes the owner himself will call me to make sure that we’re happy and we’re getting all of our needs addressed. That’s really nice because that makes you feel they care.

They’re growing themselves and I’m happy to be a part of that. They opened a new office recently and that’s nice to know that they’re doing well. It feels like they’re here to stay and they’re not just collecting money and doing nothing. There were times when we had to stretch the budget, and they made suggestions about the different things we could try. If it didn’t work, they tried something else. There was never a lack of trying.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They’re a small team, and so website changes can sometimes take a couple of days, but it depends on what the change is. For the whole time we’ve been working with them, I can’t think of anything that needs to be done differently.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Dinah’s Chicken is a restaurant. I’m the owner/manager.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Ranksharks?

Ranksharks approached me because there was a customer that was engaged in their company at that time. They explained that they could work in a way to rank me higher on the searches in Google. I had been working with someone else before, but I decided to use Ranksharks.

The goal was to increase traffic to the restaurant. Our main target was engaging new customers because once we have customers, we keep 90% of them.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They redid my website for me from scratch. I had a site that I was doing, but they totally redid it. It’s more contemporary and readable now. They help to update that, but I can also change it myself. If we do anything special, they highlight it on my site.

I already had a Facebook account, but they enhanced that. I also have Instagram and Twitter. They send out updates weekly and they’ll do a few promotions for me once in a while on Facebook, etc. if I request it. They also do promotions on my website. They call and give me updates every month and show me the results of what we doing and what kind of response we’re getting on the searches.

How did you come to work with Ranksharks?

A current customer called me and asked if I would be interested. I talked to him because I knew him personally. There was no contract so I could try it for how long I wanted at no cost for setting it up. They had a monthly fee which was reasonable. I have people who call wanting me to switch providers, but I am happy with Ranksharks.

How much have you invested with Ranksharks?

We spend between $600 and $700 per month with them. We’ve spent a total of $21,000 with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them three years ago this fall, and the relationship is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Since we engaged with them, I saw a pretty dramatic increase in new clientele. A lot of people go to our website due to our ranking and the quality of the website. It’s easy to navigate and find answers there. Nobody has complained about our website being hard to work with.

How did Ranksharks perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re easy to contact and consistent in keeping me informed. I requested that I approve anything that’s posted, and they’ve honored that. They’re very approachable and responsive to what I want to do. I like the fact that we have a monthly call and it’s not something that consumes my time.

What did you find most impressive about Ranksharks?

It feels more like a personal contact. They’re very approachable and I feel like they’re local compared to someone in another country.

Are there any areas Ranksharks could improve?

I don’t think so. When I asked if they could help with the website, they said they don’t normally do that, but they still did.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the co-founder of Melt on Demand, a web-based massage company. We're in a couple of cities and plan to be nationwide.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Ranksharks?

We needed someone to build a website. I had a WordPress version of the site, but the scheduling tools that we were using didn't work. We needed something more customized.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They redesigned and developed the site, customizing the things we needed. They also worked on social media and SEO. They are also building an iOS and Android app that will release later this year or early next year.

They built our social media platforms including Facebook, Google Plus, Twitter, and Instagram. They manage all of those and constantly post new content. They also manage our paid Facebook ads, designing some of the cartoons that we use for us.

How did you come to work with Ranksharks?

I was looking for a bigger company than a freelancer, which I had previously used. I found Ranksharks on Google. I looked them up on Yelp and they had good reviews, so I gave them a call.

How much have you invested with Ranksharks?

We have spent $45,000 with them over the course of our relationship.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in April 2016 and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Our traffic has increased every month since working with them. We didn’t have anything before, so we started at zero. Every month has at least doubled. Also, in every city, they’ve helped us rank locally for massage on-demand.

How did Ranksharks perform from a project management standpoint?

They give me updates monthly. My project manager is Sophia and she’s been with me since the beginning. She is amazing. With starting a new company, I’m probably not as responsive, but she always gets right back to me.

They’re very organized and very easy to reach. Communication is very important and I love that I can reach them right away to fix things.

What did you find most impressive about Ranksharks?

I don’t have much to compare them to, but I don’t have any complaints. If there’s something I don’t like, they really listen to me and want to work with me. Ranksharks takes my opinion into consideration when they’re doing ads and content. They like to keep it relevant to my industry.

Are there any areas Ranksharks could improve?

No.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder of a personal air filter company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Ranksharks?

We wanted to increase our exposure and maintain our various social media accounts.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We were looking for a more tailored and catered approach. After a month of working with them, we saw more exposure and engagement on our posts and an increase in brand awareness.

They leverage our Facebook advertising to get more conversions through our website. They also compile posts that are catered to our brand and align our product with our audience. They create actual content on our ad copy, as well. While our logo design and branding are done in-house, they create wonderful one-sentence taglines that sell the product.

How did you come to work with Ranksharks?

We reached out to in order to find out who was doing their branding. They forwarded me over to Travis (the founder of Ranksharks). We receive a lot of emails and solicitations from other social media marketing companies, but I decided to take the backend referral approach.

How much have you invested with Ranksharks?

Our project has cost between $800 and $1,500 per month, depending on the services provided.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in June 2016 and we’re still working with them now. We now have an in-house full-time social media manager, but they still manage our Facebook advertising because they have gotten wonderful results.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

With the help of their posting, we have a few videos that have received over 100,000 views and have been shared across multiple platforms on Facebook. One video we have received over 215,000 views. There was also an overall increase in engagement and likes to our page--about a 50% to 75% increase within the first three months.

They worked primarily on our Facebook, but a few people contacted us on Instagram complimenting our marketing work and thanking us for the coupon codes.

How did Ranksharks perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re really professional. I work with one project manager, who schedules a call with me every month. Throughout the whole process, they have always been available for phone calls and have answered any questions that I have.

They can simplify a lot of the complex marketing terms and concepts. They not only provides us a service, but they also educate us on their approach, what's being done, and how things broadly work.

What did you find most impressive about Ranksharks?

Their reporting has been great and flexibility has been great. They also give me money-saving tips, like suggesting I hire a copywriter that is slightly more brand-specific. They are not just out here to upsell me on different services, which feels different from other social media companies. They are an asset to our team and they genuinely try to help us.

Are there any areas Ranksharks could improve?

Because we’re in a niche market, it would be great to have someone that is a little more brand-specific in the postings. But considering that they handle social media across many industries, I can see why that isn’t possible.