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:angry: :angry: :angry: :angry:

Boy am i SO Flamed up!

When you think you get enough spam email they sink to new lows!

Mr Varun Shoor of kayako.com decides he's going to advertise a product I have no intrest in, and guess where he decides to do it?

He goes and creates an account in my CUSTOMER support desk to post an ADVERTISMENT for HIS crappy helpdesk. What idiot has the kind of balls or stupidity to do something like that thinking i'm going to go "Oh my god thats an awsome product let me go waste my money on a cheap ass spammers program!"

I really wish these people would get a friggin clue!

Here's the ticket he put into my helpdesk just so you know what to avoid for shady and irritating tatics!

Dear Sir,
We at Kayako Web Solutions have recently launched our flagship product i.e. eSupport, one of the most robust and flexible support solutions currently available, it features email>helpdesk, advanced ticket management, extreme tech/staff management, SMS forwarding and a lot of other unique features. We are interested in running a special discounted offer for just your customers or perhaps start some kind of partnership, we can either offer you our product at 20% off the original listed price which you can sell further to your customers at the price of your choice and also list you as our platinum partner or we can offer 10% off on eSupport’s listed price to just your customers.

We are keen to form some kind of partnership with your company and are looking forward to your reply, to know more about our company please visit http://kayako.com . Thanking You,

Regards,

Varun Shoor




I mean, hello, its not like we don't have phone numbers on our site and email address's ontop of that, I don't need clutter in my helpdesk!

:angry: :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry:

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That frosts me, too. The kicker is the last paragraph, where they expect you to learn more about their business when they obviously haven't given two seconds worth of thought to yours.

Daniel,
It was indeed me who contacted you because a person who said he was client of yours (<< name removed by request >> of hostfirst) that your were interested in this product and were looking for partnerships.

I really didnt mean to spam you or your helpdesk and I personally apologize for any problems this might have caused, I could have called you but I live in India, anyhows I am really sorry for the inconvienience.
Regards.

Varun Shoor

Well he apoligized. Better than any other spammer I've ever seen.

HELLO!!!

ofcourse he is going to apologize on WHT... he wants his product to be successful....

Spammers should be hung...

Daniel what he says is this true?

Originally posted by netsolutions
Well he apoligized. Better than any other spammer I've ever seen.

Hostexp,
What should I do then? If someone you know says that this and this person is interested in your product and you should contact him for more info, would you not contact that very person to know more and see if he is one of your potential customers? As I have said earlier I live in India and long distance to USA isnt that cheap over here, the only way I could contact 'em was through their helpdesk, Frankly speaking I had no intention of spamming them. Just consider yourself at my position and you will understand what I am trying to say.

Daniel,
Today I talked to << name removed by request >> and he said he was one of your ex clients and what he meant to say was that you "might" be interested in my product or selling it your clients. It was my mistake to take him seriously and place a ticket on your support desk. If you still don't believe me you can contact him directly.

Regards

Ahem ;)

Lets wait for daniel to reply.

One question,

1. why would you target your spam towards a company who already has a support system?

Hostexp,
I didnt offer them my support system, if you look at the contents of ticket, I wanted some kind of partnership so I could sell my product at discount >exclusively< to their clients.

The ticket doesnt even mention a single word saying that I wished to sell the support system to them.

Regards.

eSupport, one of the most robust and flexible support solutions currently available, it features email>helpdesk, advanced ticket management, extreme tech/staff management, SMS forwarding and a lot of other unique features. We are interested in running a special discounted offer for just your customers or perhaps start some kind of partnership, we can either offer you our product at 20% off the original listed price which you can sell further to your customers at the price of your choice and also list you as our platinum partner or we can offer 10% off on eSupport’s listed price to just your customers.

That sure sounds like a description for a support desk ;)

anyway in my opinion its spam...

Its like saying, your friend told you that microsoft would like to buy out your company :)

1. why would you target your spam towards a company who already has a support system?

Silly question. If I were selling a product I would target anyone who would have a use for the product - not just those who didn't have it.

Anyway Varun just clarified that he was proposing a reselling partnership rather than offering the support system itself to Ventures. Although admittedly on initial reading of the email it isn't so clear.

IMO the only thing he did wrong was posting it to the Daniel's support desk rather than emailing him directly.

The problem with this thread is Daniel's choice words of 'Scum', 'idiot' and 'crappy'. If this is how he reacts to all misplaced partnership offers then I suggest he takes up some anger management counselling.

But keep on fanning the flames Hostexp - seems like you're enjoying it.

haha, i'm just trying to find the truth out...

e-mailing it to Daniel would be SPAM if Daniel never requested the partnership information in the FIRST place...

Anyway i'll let this thread be ;)


Originally posted by Tyler Durden


Sill question. If I were selling a product I would target anyone who would have a use for the product - not just those who didn't have it.

Anyway Varun just clarified that he was proposing a reselling partnership rather than offering the support system itself to Ventures. Although admittedly on initial reading of the email it isn't so clear.

IMO the only thing he did wrong was posting it to the Daniel's support desk rather than emailing him directly.

The problem with this thread is Daniel's choice words of 'Scum', 'idiot' and 'crappy'. If this is how he reacts to all misplaced partnership offers then I suggest he takes up some anger management counselling.

But keep on fanning the flames Hostexp - seems like you're enjoying it.

Hostexp,
I didnt offer them my support system, if you look at the contents of ticket, I wanted some kind of partnership so I could sell my product at discount >exclusively< to their clients.


That wasnt said in the right manner, sorry but my first language isnt english

I meant to say that I didnt offer them my support system for sale, what i was looking forward to was partnership and thats what the ticket is about, INMO Daniel mistook the email as an advertisement.

Regards.

dp

entertaining :) pass the popcorn and pop ;P

oh ok :)

Everythings all "ok" now :D

Thanks for clarifying the matter.

Originally posted by VarunShoor


That wasnt said in the right manner, sorry but my first language isnt english

I meant to say that I didnt offer them my support system for sale, what i was looking forward to was partnership and thats what the ticket is about, INMO Daniel mistook the email as an advertisement.

Regards.

I played with their online demo and put a real e-mail address in to test it. What happens...... a bunch of unwanted e-mails follow about bying it.

That is not a good way to get customers. I for one deleted the bookmark for ever going back to consider buying it.

:mad:

Originally posted by addaction
I played with their online demo and put a real e-mail address in to test it. What happens...... a bunch of unwanted e-mails follow about bying it.

That is not a good way to get customers. I for one deleted the bookmark for ever going back to consider buying it.

:mad:

addaction,
Only one email was sent from the demo area and that too was to notify our testers of the expiration of our Introductory Price offer, other emails you might have recieved could have been due to other people replying to demo tickets you created, Just PM or email me your address or ticket no and I will personally remove it. Hope that helps.

Regards.

Even if it was ONE e-mail..... I DID NOT ASK for that e-mail, which makes it SPAM!

addaction,
We are sorry about that, this was indeed wrong and we are putting up an option to disable emails and TOS on demo page.

Regards

Originally posted by VarunShoor

What should I do then? If someone you know says that this and this person is interested in your product and you should contact him for more info, would you not contact that very person to know more and see if he is one of your potential customers?


Varun Shoor,

Absolutely, but If you ever find yourself in this situation again, one simple line may have helped. Adding something like "<< name removed by request >> of hostfirst suggested I contact you about a partnership" would have done wonders to make this not sound so offensive.

Also, if Daniel was referred to you by a friend, addressing him by name instead of "Dear Sir" would have been nice. (I realize that "Dear Sir" may be the convention in India, but you're not dealing with someone from India)

I don't know what made you choose to submit a support ticket instead of writing an e-mail... that's just bad form, but if you were indeed told of Daniel by a friend then telling him so would have been a good idea.

Just my two cents...

BravoComm,
Yes, "Dear Sir" is a common convention in India, well their Contact Us page with emails was listed at bottom right corner in small fonts and I didnt see it while I wanted to ask this, so i clicked on Support and there was choice of forums, helpdesk etc. If I had posted in forums it would definately have been a bad choice so I choosed helpdesk to contact them.

No one really told me of Daniel directly, the person I know referred to VenturesOnline because he was an ex client of them, this was one of the reasons i choosed to address the letter using "Dear Sir".

Regards.

Originally posted by Tyler Durden
IMO the only thing he did wrong was posting it to the Daniel's support desk rather than emailing him directly.
Agreed. I'd probably ask that emails be sent, rather than support requests, but other than that, a company that offers support desks for hosts, offering a partnership to a host? Not something I'd personally get my knickers in a bunch over.

The idea behind his proposal isn't the issue, it is the way it was presented, It could be the best idea in the world but present it wrong and I could care less. I already get enough spam as is and its annoying enough to have to delete from your email, but even worse is when it appears in a support desk for customers. Also, even if it was a referal, there was no mention whatso ever to make that letter any more personalized. Sounds like a clear cut copy n paste advertisment.

Also, you may not like my choice of words, but I believe fully in speaking whats on my mind, everybodys different so everybody has different ways to express themselves , which is exactly what I did in expressing my feelings regarding this person.

Oh well, back to work.

Also a small addition, I know you were talking partner, but get real, you mention "Platinum Partner " or just plain Partner, those don't mean a thing, the reason its such a cut and dry advertisment and a supposed proposal is because it'll probabbly be copied with the exact same wording to who knows how many other places, just because you use the word partner doesn't make it any more special.

Originally posted by addaction
Even if it was ONE e-mail..... I DID NOT ASK for that e-mail, which makes it SPAM!

Erm, well one e-mail wouldn't make it spam... Spam is unsolicited bulk e-mail remember?

We get spam, as well as unwanted solicitations everyday. The spam is dealt with as it should and reported. The unsolicited offers are just deleted.

Entering the offer into the helpdesk probably wasn't the brightest thing to do, but at the end of the day it's little more than a brief irritation. I get a little steamed with people offering us design and hosting services (which kind of shows they didn't even go to the site), but beyond that it's nothing to be overly concerned about. Last time I looked, having a cool head was a handy trait to have in webhosting :D

Greg Moore

Its funny ...but we got the exact same email :D

Well he's probably just doing the rounds of the WHT membership like a few others tend to do. In itself not an overly bad thing to do. I would think placing an ad in the forum here would possibly work better though :)

Greg Moore

lol Akashik, i think your next on his hit list ;)

Originally posted by Kiwi
Its funny ...but we got the exact same email :D

Originally posted by Hostexp
lol Akashik, i think your next on his hit list ;)

Heh, well he'll be a little disappointed. We're looking at Perl Desk which will do the deed perfectly well. Being free as well makes the decision a lot easier :D

Greg Moore

lol ;) free for how long? :D

perl :(

php :)

Originally posted by VarunShoor


That wasnt said in the right manner, sorry but my first language isnt english

I meant to say that I didnt offer them my support system for sale, what i was looking forward to was partnership and thats what the ticket is about, INMO Daniel mistook the email as an advertisement.

Regards.

well, varun sending commerical email to anybody who didn't exclusively requested it is spam.

i hope you may not be knowing this but until you did not find any email address for information on the web site do not send email to default addresses like sales, support and trouble ticket etc., infect you can email them and ask for proper person's email address where you can send the proposal.

anyway i understand you may not be knowing this. so, i request other people particularly HostExp not to bash varun so hard.

cheers and best of luck for your product.

:)

OK, at the risk of being boiled in oil and tarred and feathered, I'll offer my two cents... Who among us, confident about a new product or service or script that we had, did not try to find a market for our wares? We should not condemn Mr. Varun Shoor of kayako.com for doing what we would all like to do, that is to tell as many people as we can about what we have to offer. Promotion and marketing are essential to the health of any business. Perhaps his method this time was "over the edge". He apologized, and that is really all that we should expect of him. As for the "esupport" help desk that his company makes. Has anyone looked at it, or tried it? I received an "unsolicited" offer from Mr. Shoor. Had I blindly ignored it as spam, which it was not, I would have missed an opportunity to test trial a really great help desk. The only reason why my company did not buy it had to do with a licensing policy where the application would not install unless it could successfully "calls home". Bad past experiences with a product using a similar policy precluded our board from approving Mr. Shoor's product, but other than that it exceeded all of our requirements. If Mr. Shoor's company changes their licensing policy, we'll sign on in a heartbeat!