Complaint Review: Search Initiatives - Elocal Listing

I worked at elocal in their customer service department for over a year, I will try and paint a picture for you. We had weekly ' MANDATORY" meetings with Todd Johnson they would last for an hour, it felt more like hours. He shoves God down your throat and tells you what losers you are if you do not follow His ( Todds) teachings. He tells us stories of how he grew up sexually abused and addicted to drugs and how his nickname was " catman" because of the sexual things he did with cats while he was high.

He told us over and over again that none of us will ever know the power he feels unless we sit with a loaded gun in our mouths! He would assure us everything in our lives would all be ok, whatever problems we were facing because Google was going to buy us and all the stock we had would one day pay off. I never left to get a better job because they held this d**n stock over your head. How can you leave when all you have ever made is minimum wage and now your working for a company that compares itself to Microsoft.

The customers call in upset because their not up, they want a manager but your not allowed to bother her, you get 50 calls a day to cancel and then upper management threatens to fire you if you do not save these customers! All the CEOs walk around saying " your only experiencing a small portion of our customers" when they are asked why so many customers are canceling. Well the truth is that it was all of our customers! Now they are laying off mass amounts of people and although we were all told we would receive stock information in the mail and that we are still share holders, NOT one person has yet to receive those papers in the mail! I feel those meetings violated my civil rights and I feel betrayed and lied to about the product my company sold!

Trust me when I say this its like a cult in their and EVERY employee believes what they are told. People will rebuttal this and say Im just mad because I was laid off. Well so many people feel the way I do and they are just to afraid of losing their stock to walk away. There is a very strange cult feel to that place and it is not right. I am sorry to all of the customers that had to deal with elocal. Get your money back while you can! Yahoo does not even allow elocal listings anymore. Elocal is a scam!

"I should assure you that Search Initiatives and eLocalListing continue to grow and thrive in the world of local search and ecommerce. We have made enormous progress in the past year and are confident that we will be able to offer a great return to our investors."

How so? hasn't the company just downsized to less then 50% of the workforce this month alone?
How about the 60% of customer cancellations within the first month?
How about all the lawsuits pending?
How about the truth for once?

"I should perhaps note that we only accept investment from private investors who declare that they are accredited' as defined by the SEC which is to say assets in excess of one million dollars. It makes no sense that you would invest a child's college fund in this kind of investment, nor would we have accepted it if you had not stated in writing that you were an accredited investor and thus in a position to afford this kind of investment."

Here is there pitiful attempt to justify there actions, and make it look like its your fault for investing/falling for the pitch.

I am sure Mr. Angelo that you like hundreds of customers who call elocal everyday don't get there call answered. They know there product is failing, yahoo has begun to remove there profiles from their search engines. They don't know what to do and are now striving for more investors to scam. Recently they have gone for non domestic investors because in my opinion the same laws don't protect them as domestic investors.

After a little research...

by blainemansfield
06/10/2008

"Todd Johnson AND Mike Ruter again? Looks like the same thing as the old Netpage Communications bankruptcy scandal from back in 97-98. Todd was the "Director of Sales" and Mike was an "Area Sales Manager". One has to wonder if THAT was included on thier resumes when they actually got investors to back them again?"

Current titles at elocal
Todd Johnson (2nd hand Joel Olsteen) = VP of Sales
Mike Ruter = Director of Training / Resellers

http://local.yahoo.com/details?id=34785844&stx=elocal+listing&csz=Temecula+CA&ed=Gp3596160Swj3h.xJZJ3jbZkkhljy2AgYlVY9_uomJ6YdOtO1mjEVYjhVMepVw4Laq5V4ttxFF4unNdZbAam1ZB_7JY-

Keep in Mind that the listing above can not be forged or duplicated or changed because the medium is controlled by www.yahoo.com. which means elocal cannot do anything to change it.

Funny thing according to investors of Relevant yellow ( Relevant Yellow -> Zone Communications -> eLocal Listing, LLC) the same happened to them, THEY GOT SCREWED in the same way!

Don't take my word for it go research it for yourself and the truth will set you free.

P.S. If you are a customer with elocal ask them to give you a data sheet showing where you are at on all the search engines they promised to put you on (25-50 Search Engines )as stated on the T.P.V. (Third Party Verification) Recording. If they cannot provide you with this data sheet cancel immediately as you are being scammed as well.

elocal sales floor modo
"if you can dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull$h*t"

I am Ralph Williams and I'm Chief Financial Officer of Search Initiatives and our subsidiary company eLocalListing.

I was very disturbed and surprised to read your post especially as I have no record or recollection of any attempt by you to speak to me or any of our team at any point in recent months. I should assure you that Search Initiatives and eLocalListing continue to grow and thrive in the world of local search and ecommerce. We have made enormous progress in the past year and are confident that we will be able to offer a great return to our investors.

I should perhaps note that we only accept investment from private investors who declare that they are accredited' as defined by the SEC which is to say assets in excess of one million dollars. It makes no sense that you would invest a child's college fund in this kind of investment, nor would we have accepted it if you had not stated in writing that you were an accredited investor and thus in a position to afford this kind of investment.

I strongly refute your assertion that we are in some way in need of being brought to justice. Had you contacted us at any point we would have been happy to discuss our progress and allay your concerns, rather than making inflammatory and ill founded public accusations. Please contact me (you have my numbers as they are included in all investor communications we send out) and I will be happy to discuss and attempt to resolve your concerns.

Sincerely,

Ralph Williams
Chief Financial Officer