Ian P Few
map-marker Culver City, California

Spent £250,000 with ReachLocal

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I got 50% back after I exposed them, its a con/fraud .but a very very smart clever Fraud. I was the first customer signed up to Reach local .the CEO John Mazur signed me up
View full review
Loss:
$150000
Pros:
  • Its a con
Cons:
  • Clever con

User's recommendation: Glad I helped make them go bust in the UK

peter k Hyv

Used them in australia, fraudelent claims. keep away

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spent over $6000 on social media what a waist of money we have our own anaylitics and we only had 5 clicks to our website
View full review
Loss:
$6000
Cons:
  • Everthing about this company
Reason of review:
Bad quality

Preferred solution: Full refund

Company responded
Anonymous

Worst Company

We signed up in November 2017. We signed up for 4 months SEM, we were inundated with sales calls and wrong numbers. Even after the 4 months, we didn't sign another contract but they kept charging us. Complained several times, tried cancelling, they just kept sending bills. I had to beg to get statistics, reports. Apparently I was able to get online but their sales person never instructed us on how to get them. We have wasted thousands of dollars with very little return on investment. We dreaded when a ReachLocal call came in because we knew it would be garbage. They have no idea what they are doing. Please do not waste your money! We have worked with several companies doing SEM and SEO, this one is horrible!
View full review
Reason of review:
Bad quality
1 comment
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

We're sorry to read this. A positive client experience is our top priority, which is why we have an easy-to-reach customer support line listed on our website and an easy 30-day cancellation policy that's outlined in our Terms & Conditions.

We apologize for your experience and invite you to reach out to us to further discuss this by calling us at (877) 525-6084 or emailing clientcare@reachlocal.com. Thank you.

Anonymous

Excellent results however I was lied too by CEO John Mazur who signed me up

Reachlocal - Excellent results however I was lied too by CEO John Mazur who signed me up
Reachlocal - Excellent results however I was lied too by CEO John Mazur who signed me up - Image 2
I spent over £250,000 with ReachLocal UK The offer and contract was simple, they charged me a 10% management fee on top of whatever I chose to spend with Google on pay per click (my campaign budget) Reach Local Sales Pitch eg – You Spend on Ad £1000 a month + 10% fee The Con They actually KEEP 40-50% of Ad Spend + charge you 10% fee I'm lucky I got my money back. The CEO John Mazur and Sales Director Richard Bray both personally signed me up personally. I have a recording (kept safe) of the Platform Director admitting that ReachLocal have 2x platforms, platform 1 which customer see, this platform shows the customer how and when every penny is spent with Google creating the illusion that ALL your advertising spend (aka campaign budget) is being spent appropriately with Google (Bing etc). Platform 2 (which the customer doesn't see) shows the real spend which is at least 50% less than the customer thinks/believes is being spent on the advertising campaign. Platform 2 which is hidden and ReachLocal deny exists, is vital to ReachLocals business as Google has to audit ReachLocal to ensure it is operating within Googles operating polices, ReachLocal show Google Platform 2, not the customer facing Platform 1. How do you get your money back? Do what I did, it’s very easy. Call up all the sales staff individually and pose as a potential client, ask questions & ask them for customer testimonials…they then brag and tell you their big customers, delighted to name names. Contact every customer and let them know, offer to meet and show them (I met Mercedes who spent £100,000 per month with Reach Local) Reach Local will be delighted to see the back of you. Sadly for the good decent staff at Reach Local UK, by the time they I had spent every day for 2mths contacting their clients, the then CEO Craig Harris made a decision to get rid of me by giving my money back, Reach Local was now losing money as customer left in their droves. Interestingly Craig Harris had come to the UK from Reach Local Australia who had the same problems with customers finding out they had been lied too and weren’t being charged 10% management but rather 50-60%, Craig managed to successfully contain the problem and steer ReachLocal Auz onwards and upwards. Here’s Craig’s contact – Craig Harris Managing Director & C.O.O. Reachlocal Europe BV m: +31 6 ** ** ** ** I though ReachLocal service levels and trackability of pay per click key words using proxy numbers was an excellent service. It’s a shame ReachLocal is dishonest, lies and misleads customers, if they had some integrity there would still be a Reach Local UK today. To be honest Im amazed that ReachLocal is still going in other countries and that customers have not worken up to this Scam. I can confirm that Met Police Financial Crimes Directorate are aware of this Scam Ian Puddick London
View full review
Pros:
  • Ppc trackability
Cons:
  • Charged me 50 per cent more than they agreed too
Reason of review:
Not as described/ advertised
2 comments
Guest

I heard this guy is a competitor now - had nothing but excellent results from ReachLocal and loved their CEO who always went the extra mile for our business.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1444622

I too had an excellent experience with ReachLocal and John Mazur who handled all our advertising for 40 locations. This review is from a competitor who lost his biggest client to ReachLocal.

View more comments (1)
Anonymous

Spent Thousands of $$$ with nothing to show for it.

Signed up to do a geo-fence campaign with them and was a total disaster and waste of money. NOT ONE SALE FROM THEIR AD CAMPAIGN!!! So when i was getting bad results, I wanted to just cancel..but oh no,m they had my money and there was no way they were letting me cancel. So they put me into some other campaign telling me it would be better...NOPE...I've come to grips with it...I GOT SCAMMED. They through a bunch of numbers at me and tried to say it was my fault. Bottom line, if you want to just throw your money away for nothing give them a call.
View full review
Reason of review:
Bad quality
Company responded
Garnetta Yrb

Never trust reach local, I was cheated badly

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I am a pest controller and paid $1780 to advertise my businesses. And in return I got very big zero. They do not have basic level of honesty and intergrity. Free site like gumtree is far better then Reach local. I strongly suggest anyone to avoid them. Bal 042479****
View full review
Reason of review:
Bad quality
1 comment
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

Bal, We've had your representative reach out to you to about this and hope we can reach a resolution. Please don't hesitate to reach out to your representative with any questions.

We look forward to speaking with you. Thank you.

Resolved
Shelonda Sjg

Resolved: Cheating company

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Updated by user Jun 15, 2017

There was a misunderstanding which has now been clarified. My digital marketing consultant was able to quickly resolve for me and I’m happy with the campaigns that my consultant is running for me at ReachLocal.

Updated by user Jun 12, 2017

it was resoloved

Original review Jun 10, 2017
Am a Indian astrologer I advertise my business in this company but these people. Cheated me very badly don't trust them
View full review
Pros:
  • It was nice
Reason of review:
Not as described/ advertised
Company responded
Quartez Qcv

I have been lied

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Reach local told me that they gonna look after my marketing campaigner and force to sign contract. I told them to start contract from 15 of January and filed form , They took payment in December form My credit card. I contacted after my first cycle finished for SEO and google Adwords Then they said that sorry we targeted wrong area. And mean while i was feeling that something going wrong i stop my card. At the end of second cycle they are calling me and asking to pay them . I said give me report what yu have done why i havent got single client . You targeted wrong area thats your problem not mine . I need result . So, Now i am asking them to give me report no response not picking my phone . I really dont know what should i have to do ? Now i came to know there is many people who has cheated from them .
View full review
Loss:
$4500
Cons:
  • Being misled
  • Poor performance of work
  • Being lied to
Reason of review:
Bad quality
1 comment
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

Hi Sejal,

Our records indicate that our team unsuccessfully attempted to contact you by phone and email approximately 25 times. Our reports also show that between Jan 25th and February 18th we were able to generate 13 phone calls and two web events for your business, however due to the lack of proper voicemail systems and call forwarding only one phone call was answered on your end.

Finally, SEO Review Reports were sent over to you on 31/01/17 and again on 17/02/17.

We have been trying to contact you via both your landline and mobile as well as sending you emails to discuss this matter further but have unfortunately been unable to leave a message or get through to you. Could you please contact your representative at your earliest convenience so that we can discuss your concerns?

Kind Regards,

ReachLocal

Company responded
Stephanee Dbe
map-marker Huntington Beach, California

Resolved: Worst Experience Ever

Reachlocal - Worst Experience Ever
Updated by user Nov 20, 2015

They are working with us to resolve the issue.

Original review Nov 20, 2015
I was running a very successful PPC campaign for an urgent care customer. ReachLocal promised to bring in more business, expand their web presence through their superior technology. It has been a complete disaster. Calls went way down, visits to the urgent care went way down. I gave them access to my Google Adwords account so they could improve the campaign and see the keywords that worked. They never took a look. We were locked into a 12 month contract and they would not let us out. Each month, I'd get a new report showing poor results. I sent graphs showing a 30% decline in web visits. I told them the radius to use instead of covering the entire city. I recommended keywords to cut to be more focused. They ignored my requests. I looked at their budget spending and it was all over the place. Our budget allowed for $70 per day. Some days they were spending $28 - $35 dollars and we had no business. Inexcusable. Date Impressions Visits* Calls Web Events Calls Per Day 30-Apr 10028 297 36 102 0.4 26-May 21443 592 110 145 1.2 19-Jun 26772 811 153 217 1.7 1-Jul 13520 449 84 120 0.9 1-Aug 10720 323 67 87 0.7 1-Sep 22506 888 204 211 2.3 30-Oct 20525 626 182 171 2.0 They'd actually say the call volume was going up. At their best it was pulling 2.3 call per day per urgent care location. That is a horrible track record. The final straw, our poor results dropped to exceptionally poor results. They failed to update the URL's for Google's switch. Google warned about this new format for months. Check out the graph and see how results declined for yourself. We finally got out of the contract early. It was the worst experience ever. Find a local pro who can do PPC better.
View full review
Loss:
$24000
Reason of review:
Poor customer service

Preferred solution: Full refund

4 comments
Guest

You didn't really. You let us out of our contract which was the right thing to do considering your campaigns were costing our business thousands in lost revenue each month.

You offered a credit for your mistakes and then wouldn't let us use it unless we stayed with you for another month. Our business shot up as soon as we left as Google Analytics will prove.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1132056

How did you get them to let u out?? Your story is very similar to mine.

ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

Hello, Our employees are trained to interact professionally and courteously. We would like to look into this incident but need some details.

Please contact us directly at clientcare@reachlocal.com. Thanks.

ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

We're glad we could resolve your issue.

View more comments (3)
Company responded
Anonymous
map-marker Brisbane, Queensland

Piggy backing on existing site

After some time we found that reach local had simply attached their format to our existing website ! the print out of calls read like a preschool play and had as much credibility as the taliban I could have got my 5 year old grandaughter to answer the calls and had more success There has been no follow up as promised no emails or visitation the whole thing seems to be a scam ! once the money is paid they run away to find another victim We were promised increases in sales enquiries and all the other things relevant to their expensive and inefficient program Not happy Jan
View full review
Loss:
$10000
Reason of review:
Poor customer service
1 comment
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

Bill, We're glad you were able to speak to your ReachLocal representative and reach a resolution. Please reach out to us directly at 1300 655 312 if you have any further questions or concerns. Thank you.

Company responded
Anonymous
map-marker Prescott, Arizona

Not A Good Company

I just do not like this company, don't like the service and have been insulted by my rep. I have added texting to my site, much less money and works better. Their operators in the conversations emailed to me were misleading my clients and making them think they were trying to connect them to me when they were never doing anything of the such. I feel that is very misleading. I say keep looking, better options out there, the text messaging option is much better and allows you to engage your customer and not have other uninformed people talking to them
View full review
Reason of review:
Poor customer service
3 comments
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

We're having trouble locating you in our system. We would like to talk to you to gather more information about your experience as our top priority is providing our clients with top notch service.

Please contact us directly at clientcare@reachlocal.com. Thank you.

Garnetta Yrb
reply icon Replying to comment of ReachLocal Response

Your client care e-mail is never responded it's too bad

ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response
reply icon Replying to comment of Garnetta Yrb

Hi, Bal. We received your email to our client care email in Australia.

We've been in touch. Thanks!

View more comments (2)
Anonymous
map-marker Toronto, Ontario

ReachLocal - Seo Service Review from Toronto, Ontario

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They forced further cycles of SEO services on my CC when I told them that it wasn't working for me. I was getting called from solicitors than actual customers. I was losing money from their service. The people calling me would sometimes ask useless questions and nothing else. For example, one service I provide is skylight replacements... One person called only to ask,"in my professional opinion, what soap should i buy to clean my skylight". They clearly only care about directing as many people to your website without them be valuable leads. They just want to make sure they get their clicks, so they can have another cycle(another payment from you) I was also paying for a website. The website was designed well but I was paying much much more than I later found out web designers and server actually cost. When I finally got them to stop, they decided to add one more cycle of adwords directing people to my website (website was hosted by them). Coincidentally on the last month of my SEO, my website kept crashing, making the adwords useless, since leads would be directed to a crashed website. They have some very talented people working there but the service also doesn't work for everyone. They also can be very unethical in what they do to you so be careful before hiring them. Stay away from contracts with them. I would never go back to them.
View full review
Reason of review:
Bad quality
Anonymous
map-marker Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania

ReachLocal - Deception and Misleading Conduct

Reachlocal is about to be brought to account for there deceptive and misleading conduct. A class action is underway. This is a case with over 200 applicants and counting. If you are one of those who has been mislead by Reachlocal, get on board now and join the class action. Also spread the word to others whom you know have been clients of Reachlocal. They have the right to know. Obviously, there are more and more clients of Reachlocal have noticed that they have been ripped off with their budget spent.

If you want to join, this is the CASE NO. 2:14-cv-03400.

View full review
19 comments
Guest

I’m in. These people need to pay

Guest

They are crooks. They even put a non performance clause in their contracts...

Over promise, under deliver and feed you with lies!

No transparency either! Crooks, Crooks, Crooks!!!

Guest

I'm based in England and the ReachLocal UK company is currently in Administration.

Does anyone have any info of any similar action being taken against them over here as I'm guessing it is effectively classified as a separate company.

Or if there's any way we could join this suit it would be great to know more please.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1117602

You can of course talk to the administrators and see if they are willing to hand the case over to the Secretary of state. At the moment Reachlocal are in admin BUT you can get that changed to an official receiver/insolvency service to take over and then it will become a secretary of state situation who could then act for the clients (you) and try and prosecute the people responsible

Guest

i'm in Australia and would like to know more about the UK lawsuit, but also , is there any class action being taken in Oz, ?

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1077814

We are building a class action in Australia and the US. If you would like to register interest go to www.ppcclaim.co.uk

Guest

what is the latest with the class action and what are the claims of the plaintiff?

Guest

I'm in Australia and am trying to get out of our contract with them.. Do you have any info of were I can get assistance in Australia or an industry body ect .

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1015547

Just stop payment. It's too costly for them to take it to court.

Guest

In my case the company name was used as an add word to boost the figures. I was paying for clients who just put my company name into the address bar to shortcut to my webpage.

View more comments (18)
Anonymous
map-marker Tempe, Arizona

Worst SEO company possible

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Where do I begin with the issues! I needed a new company web site, so after talking with several other companies I decided to go with RL, at a $1700 monthly commitment on my part. We started with web design of our new company pages, I wrote ALL text and sent .wd files over to Robbie Brito at Reach to then send to his outsourced developer. Now, I am a great Mover, but not a copy/text technical writer, but when I got the finished product back 3-weeks later, there were basic grammar errors, spelling errors, when I asked for a picture to be inserted, they literally wrote “insert pic here”, with NO picture. We went back & forth on the web corrections for 2 more months, they never fixed the problems. Then I ran analytics on the site that they built; 112 coding errors, 5 major issues w/ Google capability, numerous +/- keyword issues, and of course, they failed to fix any of these issues. Their sales people (and that’s exactly what they are) lie to your face very easily, but never provide results. I had to hire another company to monitor the web sites issues. It got to the point that I was having WEEKLY status meeting with Robbie Brito / RL Sales, to “fix” the issues. I finally told him that I was spending so much time doing his job, that I didn’t have time to grow my business. Very poorly run company! If you call their Phoenix office, they don’t even have a receptionist, it is all V/M. I ended up canceling my contract with RL, and found a much better company that actually knows what they are doing; Today’s Local Media out of Dallas. Now, RL is holding me hostage and will not take the web site laden with issues/errors down, so Google thinks it’s a duplicate. I have literally had to go to their office and sit for hours at a time to get a response! Horrible company w/ really bad employees! Levi Ferrin Move-U Packing & Moving
View full review
Loss:
$6500
Pros:
  • Sales people dress nice
Cons:
  • Ability
  • Being misled
  • Being lied to
Reason of review:
Damaged or defective

Preferred solution: Take your web site down!

Company responded
Ahmod Pno
map-marker Edmonton, Alberta

Talk Big with Zero Results

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My campaign with ReachLocal has started from Sep 02, 2015 and have paid for two cycles till date. As the campaign is supposed to bring me more business and increase the traffic and the phone ringing but unfortunately your campaign did not add any revenue to my business in last 35 days. Here is the full story : I used to run my own campaign with Google directly and was getting over 10 corporate clients every month which add revenue to my business over $20,000 every month. Which was fairly discussed and mentioned to Kail Schofield and I was told that ReachLocal will bring more traffic to my business with low CPC and generate more revenue to my business and when ReachLocal is ready I have to stop my campaign with Google. I stopped my campaign on Sep 03, 2015 with Google on the request of Kail and gave full opportunity to Reach Local to bring the business in for me. Unfortunately Reach Local did not bring me any business call which can generate me revenue in 20 days. As I was losing business in the open market and decided to go back to my own campaign on Sep 23, 2015 and my campaign started generating the business at the very next day and I was back on the track. From Sep 23, 2015 to Oct 06, 2016, in just 14 days I have got clients over $10,000 from my own campaign and Reach Local campaign still did not generate any revenue for me. On Sep 29, 2015 Kail and one of his marketing manager came to see me to discuss the campaign we decided to do some changes in the campaign but it has been one week and still no positive results came up. I don't know what is your marketing strategy but I am losing business if I depend only on your campaign. I have paid $3,360 ($3200 + $160 GST) to ReachLocal for two cycles and it did not generate me business for even $1 till today. Please look into the matter and cancel my contract with no cancellation fees and refund the amount paid for nothing. Ramneek Trehan Trehan & Company - Edmonton
View full review
Loss:
$11100
Cons:
  • You feel ripped off
  • Poor performance of work
Reason of review:
Bad quality

Preferred solution: Full refund

3 comments
ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

As promised, our customer advocacy team has been in contact with you. If you have any further comments, please contact our customer advocacy team directly at clientcare@reachlocal.com. Thank you.

Guest

I spoke to ReachLocal clientcare and eventually my contract been cancelled and I got the refund for $1850 + GST paid for the recent cycle. Just booked a loss for $1350 with them.

I am free with them now and don't want to do the business with them.

Guest

Hi Ramneek,

About a year ago I was approached by Reach Local (cold call) for them to manage my AdWords account in largely the same manner as you.

What they didn't tell me upfront, and what I had to find out myself when I read their extensively worded contract, was that in addition to their monthly management fee, the Google spend amount is also paid directly to Reach Local, and if you terminate the contract early, you have to pay Reach Local their monthly fee PLUS the Google spend amount that you would have paid them had you not terminated the contract early.

Why would (or should) Reach Local be entitled to the unspent Google spent amount as compensation (given that this amount would naturally be paid to Google, and not to Reach Local), and furthermore, why wouldn't Reach Local make this clear to you before you signed up with them?

I think you may need to consult with a lawyer to terminate the contract, and I recommend that you manage your own account.

Anonymous

View more comments (2)
Company responded
Anonymous
map-marker Houston, Texas

Non-compliant website?

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We had ReachLocal call, stating that they had talked to us in January about our website being non-compliant and that we needed to call them back to resolve the issue. First of all, non-compliant with what? We are following all rules as required by the State (i.e. license numbers with advertising, etc.). Secondly, we have never talked to ReachLocal. We aren't sure why they would attempt to start a business relationship with a lie, which is always a precursor to how things may go in the future. After googling them and realizing that they are a marketing firm, we were glad that we've had no contact with them, their reputation is horrid.
View full review
Cons:
  • Deceptive practices
  • Being lied to
Reason of review:
Deceptive practices
3 comments
Guest

Did they get around to telling you they would be keeping over 60% of your entire marketing budget for themselves if you signed with them ?!!!!! If they tried to deceive you into believing you had a previous relationship to get the business, do you think any clients are told how they actually charge, this is the real scam here?

They work very hard at hiding this detail from everyone. Complete sham company, no disclosure around the costs, lie, cheat and steal as much as you can is their mantra.

Guest
reply icon Replying to comment of Guest-1140702

Why are you anonymous if you have nothing to hide? I'm looking for the truth BEFORE I engage with this company, but would like to know the particulars, not everything being so ambiguous.

ReachLocalCares
ReachLocal Response

Kelly, Our employees are required to identify themselves and ReachLocal when calling clients or potential clients. While it sounds like they may have been calling to talk to you about making sure your website was mobile-friendly to comply with Google's Mobilegeddon update, it doesn't sound like that was explained correctly.

We'd love to get more information about this from you so we can ensure our employees are reaching out to clients and potential clients in a transparent way. We'll have someone on our team reach out to you at the email address provided, or you can email us directly at clientcare@reachlocal.com.

View more comments (2)

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