I used to really respect Linked In.com which for those who may not be aware, was a business forum for networking and staying in touch with your associations, often used as a source by recruiters seeking people in a specific industry to locate talent for open positions or otherwise a place to stay in touch with your alumni or former associates in your field. It's no longer the trusted place where integrity was part of its credibility. Trust had to be earned before contact was allowed. No longer, they've lowered the standards and groups have flourished with ads of all types but they're cloaked to get past the antenna of those who are offended by spam. Instead they're made to look as though one of your peers is trying to reach out to the group, which is particularly offensive. I hate to be played . It's disgusting to see the out and out attack on those who are seeking work in this drought as they are lured into the world of internet marketers hiding their identities to get contact info and whatever else it is they're getting paid on by being lied to about jobs or a service that is some magic key that will get them that coveted job offer. What makes it worse is the shill's who comment on these posts saying something positive to give the reader the impression that there's some value to the service or offering when these are simply added trickery created for the purpose of getting past the radar and developing trust. Trust ..ironically the thing LI was once rich with is now the last thing I think of when on that site.
I've noticed an alarming increase in the flow of posts and threads on Linked In aimed at the senior jobseeker who happens to be in the soup right now, with less chance of employment than ever before but who are subject to falling for the BS promoted by crafty insensitive marketers all out to make a buck since they can't earn from recruiting in this downturn.
I've seen the ploys of discussion posts with emotionally charged topics posted by some profile with a benign looking midwestern caucasian executive or pretty young face claiming to have immediate job openings over 6 six figures. The language urges those over 50 to apply now,
first come first served..and the panic is so thick you can nearly bear to watch as response after response is posted. You want to slap these people, wake them up, tell them to put their critical thinking cap back on. How on earth would a Pakistani software company be the gatekeeper to US executive career positions? Think people. Why would you need to give your social security number before you even see the position description?
In fact these are smart marketers posing as harmless peers who you wouldn't consider looking like lead generation specialists or someone who would lie to you, snag your contact info, knowing you're desperate for work, to sell to vendors your name and number to use as a marketing or spam lead. This is the target audience now, over 50 jobseekers who will spend whatever necessary to become gainfully employed and reverse the damages of the last years.
These are predators want to make a buck off the desperation out there making themselves look like networking businesses among us all.
So while some of these posts are simply trying to offer services a jobseeker might need or find useful, such as resume review or career advice, the tactics and stealth used to manipulate people into giving up their contact info and whatever else has become more psychologically geared to get past the normal smoke alarm we've been accustomed to using online. Some have mention being asked for their social security number from the gate, which is never required and should never be given cavalierly. The jobless desperation has caused many to cross threshholds they'd never cross in their right minds and the picking so ripe and easy on Linkedin, where one can easily mask and hide without worry or threat of losing membership, its a haven for the creeps who prey upon the desperate. This is what is so alarming.
As a recruiter I'm angry and irritated that LinkedIn hasn't put the kybosh down on the sneaky practices that have run rampant to bilk those who can least afford it of any money possible misleading the unemployed to believe that they'll have a better chance of employment, higher paying jobs, exclusive jobs or that some marketer has the ins on some trick to make your resume appear in the search of any recruiter, as if this has been the method of recruiters in this glut of resumes. It's just totally sad and frustrating to watch this site turn into a moshpit of unscrupulous hucksters dwelling amongst the normal business folk, with nobody calling shenanigans. Well, I have, and so have others but LinkedIn does nothing.
As a website I realize Linkedin needs traffic and content but it's thrown out its credibility to luxuriate in a sea of swill. You can't trust upon viewing that the profile is real, the intention is real, the motivation is clean or transparent or anything that was once LinkedIn's brand. Its all about volume, good bad or evil and no police to check it out. You're on your own and need to be aware of the skulking methods being used out there.
The primary boobie trap I'm reporting on is the dirty tactic to use the emotions and needs of the unemployed over 40/50 to prompt them to give up their information, lure them into a loop of fake promises only to sell their information or partner with some other marketers who are seeking to reach these folks, using their information as capital to generate their own income.
I started smelling a rat when I saw the links posted and the pretty young faces on the profiles, claiming post graduate degrees when they looked 14 and as if they were models. I followed the links and saw stolen articles that professionals from other orgs had written without credit given, then tons of google ads on the page. I spent inordinate amounts of time following these links, running checks on profiles, names and all the crazy stuff nobody has time to do. I had the time and was driven to bust these people. I reported what I found to LinkedIn and got no response. I spent time copiously proving my theory and still nothing.
It's one thing to be a business or an individual who's straight up saying, hey, I do resume writing and can improve your odds of being noticed or seen at a higher level when in competition with the hundreds of others fighting for the rare interviews, here's my name, my email...etc. But this is not how it's done with these creepy tactics. The posts that generate huge attention are purposely emotionally driven or has some fake urgency to make the desperate believe they have to respond or lose a shot at a high paying executive level position, when there's no job at all. The sad fact is that people who are desperate don't think beyond the moment. They don't realize that Pakistani or Indian based profiles are not the gatekeepers to corporate or executive careers in the US. They don't stop to wonder who is really behind the profile of this young girl posting, they don't even wonder why these profiles need their info and email addresses.
They don't apparently understand the connection to the spam in their email inbox after they give up their address. They're lucky if that's all that happens actually. Emotionally driven email, forwards, spam, ads, and cons all use the same basic psychology of human nature. Urgency, fear of loss, desperation and the emotional urgent request for help override the common sense tactic of critical thinking. Hurry up and act dont think. This is the danger.
With these alleged profile posts on LinkedIn, there's no transparency to let you know who's doing the promotion. The same goes for the new pages for companies. You can fake that too it seems. You can if you look hard enough at the similarities and go deep into the profile to find out the profiles that are recommending them, the connection, the repetitive posts from these names, discern the fact that it's one person behind multiple profiles all posing to be employees of some unknown company that turns out to be a techie site, selling tricks to scrape info from your website visitors (huh?) it gets pretty convoluted and intricate. Why do they go to such intricate lengths if the end result they're seeking isn't something very important to them? If it's not illegal or unethical, why not just ask for what you want straight up? Because it wouldn't work is the first reason.
The psychological cues that lower resistance are used everywhere by online marketers. In fact, this is one consistent similarity of profiles posting this crap, they all belong to internet marketing or inbound marketing groups on LinkedIn. They've learned their tricks from the gurus there.
Nobody would give up their name, address, email and phone just for the asking. There has to be something to gain and these marketers know it. But there also has to be an intentional urgency to override your hesitance and common sense of caution. A 6 figure income will do it when you're watching your life savings dwindle and can't get an interview after 2 years on unemployment.
If the posters used their own picture instead of a young pretty girl or actress or model, who is far less threatening and much more attention getting, they wouldn't get the same response either.
To research the most prominent perpetrators I saw posting daily and running the numbers of hits their blog sites generated, seeing how high they were, I could see many were falling for these posts. It made me furious to see how people were being duped and LinkedIn was allowing it.
Some were running as real companies using the job lure to get contact info from the entry into their site. This is always a red flag.
I've got a very large network myself after so many years as a recruiter and get asked daily for connections. I don't want to give access to spammers or creeps looking to spam those who have trusted me with their connection. I shut off my connection to open networker groups where all invitations are expected to be allowed and anyone from the group is able to contact you. This feature was the death of LinkedIn's strength and brand.
It got me running down the rabbit hole digging into profiles, making calls to see if the profile poster existed at their alleged company, using web tools to find out who registered a domain name and what that site's history was and going so far as to give up my contact info to go inside some of these sites and see what they offered or what their video was pitching. The thing that these sneaky entities had in common was the use of fake profiles which is a total affront to the LinkedIn premise which was business networking. It's been a long used source of connection with industry for recruiters and others who trusted that a profile represented a human being and was more than a shill for some site or commercial agenda.
I've seen the ploys of discussion posts with emotionally charged topics posted by some profile with a benign looking midwestern caucasian executive or pretty young face claiming to have immediate job openings over 6 six figures. The language urges those over 50 to apply now,
first come first served..and the panic is so thick you can nearly bear to watch as response after response is posted. You want to slap these people, wake them up, tell them to put their critical thinking cap back on. How on earth would a Pakistani software company be the gatekeeper to US executive career positions? Think people. Why would you need to give your social security number before you even see the position description?
In fact these are smart marketers posing as harmless peers who you wouldn't consider looking like lead generation specialists or someone who would lie to you, snag your contact info, knowing you're desperate for work, to sell to vendors your name and number to use as a marketing or spam lead. This is the target audience now, over 50 jobseekers who will spend whatever necessary to become gainfully employed and reverse the damages of the last years.
These are predators want to make a buck off the desperation out there making themselves look like networking businesses among us all.
So while some of these posts are simply trying to offer services a jobseeker might need or find useful, such as resume review or career advice, the tactics and stealth used to manipulate people into giving up their contact info and whatever else has become more psychologically geared to get past the normal smoke alarm we've been accustomed to using online. Some have mention being asked for their social security number from the gate, which is never required and should never be given cavalierly. The jobless desperation has caused many to cross threshholds they'd never cross in their right minds and the picking so ripe and easy on Linkedin, where one can easily mask and hide without worry or threat of losing membership, its a haven for the creeps who prey upon the desperate. This is what is so alarming.
As a recruiter I'm angry and irritated that LinkedIn hasn't put the kybosh down on the sneaky practices that have run rampant to bilk those who can least afford it of any money possible misleading the unemployed to believe that they'll have a better chance of employment, higher paying jobs, exclusive jobs or that some marketer has the ins on some trick to make your resume appear in the search of any recruiter, as if this has been the method of recruiters in this glut of resumes. It's just totally sad and frustrating to watch this site turn into a moshpit of unscrupulous hucksters dwelling amongst the normal business folk, with nobody calling shenanigans. Well, I have, and so have others but LinkedIn does nothing.
As a website I realize Linkedin needs traffic and content but it's thrown out its credibility to luxuriate in a sea of swill. You can't trust upon viewing that the profile is real, the intention is real, the motivation is clean or transparent or anything that was once LinkedIn's brand. Its all about volume, good bad or evil and no police to check it out. You're on your own and need to be aware of the skulking methods being used out there.
The primary boobie trap I'm reporting on is the dirty tactic to use the emotions and needs of the unemployed over 40/50 to prompt them to give up their information, lure them into a loop of fake promises only to sell their information or partner with some other marketers who are seeking to reach these folks, using their information as capital to generate their own income.
I started smelling a rat when I saw the links posted and the pretty young faces on the profiles, claiming post graduate degrees when they looked 14 and as if they were models. I followed the links and saw stolen articles that professionals from other orgs had written without credit given, then tons of google ads on the page. I spent inordinate amounts of time following these links, running checks on profiles, names and all the crazy stuff nobody has time to do. I had the time and was driven to bust these people. I reported what I found to LinkedIn and got no response. I spent time copiously proving my theory and still nothing.
It's one thing to be a business or an individual who's straight up saying, hey, I do resume writing and can improve your odds of being noticed or seen at a higher level when in competition with the hundreds of others fighting for the rare interviews, here's my name, my email...etc. But this is not how it's done with these creepy tactics. The posts that generate huge attention are purposely emotionally driven or has some fake urgency to make the desperate believe they have to respond or lose a shot at a high paying executive level position, when there's no job at all. The sad fact is that people who are desperate don't think beyond the moment. They don't realize that Pakistani or Indian based profiles are not the gatekeepers to corporate or executive careers in the US. They don't stop to wonder who is really behind the profile of this young girl posting, they don't even wonder why these profiles need their info and email addresses.
They don't apparently understand the connection to the spam in their email inbox after they give up their address. They're lucky if that's all that happens actually. Emotionally driven email, forwards, spam, ads, and cons all use the same basic psychology of human nature. Urgency, fear of loss, desperation and the emotional urgent request for help override the common sense tactic of critical thinking. Hurry up and act dont think. This is the danger.
With these alleged profile posts on LinkedIn, there's no transparency to let you know who's doing the promotion. The same goes for the new pages for companies. You can fake that too it seems. You can if you look hard enough at the similarities and go deep into the profile to find out the profiles that are recommending them, the connection, the repetitive posts from these names, discern the fact that it's one person behind multiple profiles all posing to be employees of some unknown company that turns out to be a techie site, selling tricks to scrape info from your website visitors (huh?) it gets pretty convoluted and intricate. Why do they go to such intricate lengths if the end result they're seeking isn't something very important to them? If it's not illegal or unethical, why not just ask for what you want straight up? Because it wouldn't work is the first reason.
The psychological cues that lower resistance are used everywhere by online marketers. In fact, this is one consistent similarity of profiles posting this crap, they all belong to internet marketing or inbound marketing groups on LinkedIn. They've learned their tricks from the gurus there.
Nobody would give up their name, address, email and phone just for the asking. There has to be something to gain and these marketers know it. But there also has to be an intentional urgency to override your hesitance and common sense of caution. A 6 figure income will do it when you're watching your life savings dwindle and can't get an interview after 2 years on unemployment.
If the posters used their own picture instead of a young pretty girl or actress or model, who is far less threatening and much more attention getting, they wouldn't get the same response either.
To research the most prominent perpetrators I saw posting daily and running the numbers of hits their blog sites generated, seeing how high they were, I could see many were falling for these posts. It made me furious to see how people were being duped and LinkedIn was allowing it.
Some were running as real companies using the job lure to get contact info from the entry into their site. This is always a red flag.
I've got a very large network myself after so many years as a recruiter and get asked daily for connections. I don't want to give access to spammers or creeps looking to spam those who have trusted me with their connection. I shut off my connection to open networker groups where all invitations are expected to be allowed and anyone from the group is able to contact you. This feature was the death of LinkedIn's strength and brand.
It got me running down the rabbit hole digging into profiles, making calls to see if the profile poster existed at their alleged company, using web tools to find out who registered a domain name and what that site's history was and going so far as to give up my contact info to go inside some of these sites and see what they offered or what their video was pitching. The thing that these sneaky entities had in common was the use of fake profiles which is a total affront to the LinkedIn premise which was business networking. It's been a long used source of connection with industry for recruiters and others who trusted that a profile represented a human being and was more than a shill for some site or commercial agenda.
The latter is against policy on LinkedIn, or so they say, but there aren't any checks or balances on the number of profiles you can have as I found this to be a primary way even fake companies are populated in LI company directories. These cons have spent hours putting together a handful or more fake people profiles as employees of a fake company and even slammed on 500+ connections using the open networking methodology to make them look valid. They each have recommended the others in the group and sometimes those recommendations are funny to read as they reveal a little about the mindset of the writer. When the female profiles are concocted it's funny to read they all have hobbies like weaving or some homespun type of skill, knitting, needlepoint etc. The country they are listed in starts off in Pakistan but you find the employees to have US locations though their shill company, internet website technology, is listed in Pakistan too. You find a lot of inconsistencies or hilarious education references as on claimed to have earned their PhD through online university. No name or anything, just Internet University. Perhaps that was actually the reference to their mastering internet stealth skills as a black hat marketer.
So once you're aware of these types on linked in, and have seen the profiles you can't help but look at every post with a jaundiced eye. I've stopped reading the daily group digests anymore knowing it's all a repeat of the same, rehashed, reworked, reworded, new fake profile all aimed at their traffic drive.
I've all but disconnected from every group relating to employment and marketing so I wouldn't go nuts looking at the continual attempts to cheat people on LinkedIn. I've posted details of a few of my searches and findings here to give anyone interested the details of what to look for and why I've come to this conclusion.
The posts all seem innocent upon first glance, to be promoting something or trying to be 'helpful' to the out of work, over 40 crowd by giving advice or posting topics that point to their blog page where an employment related article written by some unsuspecting professional and stolen by these shysters to get you to their real agendas. A few seem to be driving specifically unemployed people to his site where the majority of posts are plagiarized and the rest of the site is filled, literally, with google ads they get paid on if someone clicks.
It wouldn't be that irritating other than the profile originating the post on LinkedIn is presented to be a beautiful model-esque student from Pakistan whos picture is actually a Pakistani Actress and the profile body is made up to throw you off the scent, and the name of this profile is Malaika Rehman, one of many many fake profiles, but Malaika is used often and turns out to be the sockpuppet for Obaid ur Rehman who's main page is computertipsntricks.com where his first blog jobseekersover40 eventually led the reader to land where he's got links to a few tricks like anonymous email programs available and some stolen content articles scraped off another site, and ads.. lots and lots of google ads. He gets paid on those and they are all related to jobs so the odds are that as he drives traffic from major hubs he's going to get some clicks which generate revenue.
Out of curiosity I scrolled over those sneaky tricks to see his computers directory of the files and his name appeared which is how I found out who he was ..you have to laugh at a computer expert who can't hide his own identity on a website but is aiming to get you to buy some tech certification through google ads etc.
He's actually a little scary in that I ran a Google search on his name and found him listed on a separate website as a practicing lawyer for Pakistan located in Virginia, another page had him listed as a cardio surgeon living in Georgia which when you consider his age from his photo which I'd gauge to be in mid 30's find that it would be pretty spectacular of him to have earned both a JD and MD plus whatever extra it takes to be a surgeon in that time and to have requalified in the US from his native Pakistan. Let's just say I have my doubts that he's either, well, perhaps a lawyer in Pakistan which would make sense that he's turned to internet marketing using black hat techniques to drive revenues. Black hat is the term just as it sounds, the black hat cowboys of the western flicks were the 'bad guys' and there you have it.
I also noticed there were thousands of search pages with his name on them, so I put 2+2 together to determine that all those places he advertised himself were the same sorts of fields one might get Viagra spam or online pharmacy spam so he must be gathering computer identities somehow to spam them or sell as leads or otherwise generate the traffic he needs, which was over 500,000 hits at last count to make a good chunk of change from Google violating their program rules. You never know if he's applying malware or tracking software when you visit and that's what get me because I'm not hip to all the technical skulking tricks and can't define why I was spammed after looking on his sites though I never gave up my email info to his sites. Perhaps all these guys need is an IP and trace software. Who knows and the more hidden he tries to be the less I trust.
He's relentless as he rolls these innocent looking posts out daily on Linkedin and never uses even one of his 40 fake profiles bearing his own name to do it. It makes you wonder how real people are in general on LinkedIn where once it was a very credible site.
I also noticed there were thousands of search pages with his name on them, so I put 2+2 together to determine that all those places he advertised himself were the same sorts of fields one might get Viagra spam or online pharmacy spam so he must be gathering computer identities somehow to spam them or sell as leads or otherwise generate the traffic he needs, which was over 500,000 hits at last count to make a good chunk of change from Google violating their program rules. You never know if he's applying malware or tracking software when you visit and that's what get me because I'm not hip to all the technical skulking tricks and can't define why I was spammed after looking on his sites though I never gave up my email info to his sites. Perhaps all these guys need is an IP and trace software. Who knows and the more hidden he tries to be the less I trust.
He's relentless as he rolls these innocent looking posts out daily on Linkedin and never uses even one of his 40 fake profiles bearing his own name to do it. It makes you wonder how real people are in general on LinkedIn where once it was a very credible site.
There are others like Obaid I've tracked but then was sidetracked by a newcomer on the scene, the most active shill master of late is named Greig Wells of BeFound.com who is promoting his tips and counseling courses on being noticed by marketing your resume on linkedin using Search Engine Optimization tips. He never promotes himself but has the most cultlike followers of any vendor I've ever seen outside of Scientology courses. These shill profiles giving their kudos all appear in rotation and never cease to miss an opportunity to daily validate or encourage the reader that these tips helped them. Of course they don't say they got an interview or hired, they are just saying they're easily found now. Big deal.. the real problem is a shortage of jobs and the fact that hiring firms have overload of applicants to wade through and no time to search for unemployed candidates, the search firms hired to find passive candidates, aka the ones working for the competition are calling into those target companies or networking with industry people to find the needle in the haystack candidate. It just fries me to think this alleged recruiter out to help people is fleecing them by dangling a job when he has no control over that and his tactics aren't the answer. Anyway, if these people are so busy talking to recruiters now how do they have the time to post on Linkedin repeatedly every day for this guy's benefit? Odd.
Each of these fake profiles have similar traits in the body of their profile as well though he's gone to elaborate lengths to fake people out. He's just another marketer but he doesn't use transparent methods, he's stealthy and his methods discredit anything he's promoting as he's got chutzpah to stand his ground insisting these are all people he's helped. I'm not the only one who saw this weird pattern and checked some of these fake profiles out. To show your absolute disrespect for people by playing with their heads to gain confidence is what the term Con Man came from. He's apparently quite proud of his tactics and no doubt one day will write and sell his methods to other scammers for $47 a download, which is by the way what he initially charges for his training course on being found by recruiters.
That's his first step, his second tier product is a membership which is what all the internet marketing guys promote to do for ongoing revenue. Sell information, then generate a monthly membership forum and grow it. If you are telling people that the reason you're not getting interviews is because you're not easily found on LinkedIn, you're lying. Recruiters and sourcers KNOW how to find you on Linkedin but guess what? There's a severe job shortage across many industries in case you've been living in a cave for the past 2 years. Job stats aren't very encouraging either. This guy is doing what we all need to do, look outside of an employer for our own revenue generation, our own business but not at the expense of those he is unable to actually help attain their goal, offering false hope and sleight of hand BS. Someone with his ambition and intricate ability to mock up a host of shill fans that rally round his promos to gain the buy-in he's got should be able to come up with something more beneficial to the population, he'd got a lot of charisma but is using it the wrong way and Karma or the Universal law of reaping what you sow isn't going to forget to pay him back. Seriously, I hope he wakes up and finds a conscience one morning soon.
Each of these fake profiles have similar traits in the body of their profile as well though he's gone to elaborate lengths to fake people out. He's just another marketer but he doesn't use transparent methods, he's stealthy and his methods discredit anything he's promoting as he's got chutzpah to stand his ground insisting these are all people he's helped. I'm not the only one who saw this weird pattern and checked some of these fake profiles out. To show your absolute disrespect for people by playing with their heads to gain confidence is what the term Con Man came from. He's apparently quite proud of his tactics and no doubt one day will write and sell his methods to other scammers for $47 a download, which is by the way what he initially charges for his training course on being found by recruiters.
That's his first step, his second tier product is a membership which is what all the internet marketing guys promote to do for ongoing revenue. Sell information, then generate a monthly membership forum and grow it. If you are telling people that the reason you're not getting interviews is because you're not easily found on LinkedIn, you're lying. Recruiters and sourcers KNOW how to find you on Linkedin but guess what? There's a severe job shortage across many industries in case you've been living in a cave for the past 2 years. Job stats aren't very encouraging either. This guy is doing what we all need to do, look outside of an employer for our own revenue generation, our own business but not at the expense of those he is unable to actually help attain their goal, offering false hope and sleight of hand BS. Someone with his ambition and intricate ability to mock up a host of shill fans that rally round his promos to gain the buy-in he's got should be able to come up with something more beneficial to the population, he'd got a lot of charisma but is using it the wrong way and Karma or the Universal law of reaping what you sow isn't going to forget to pay him back. Seriously, I hope he wakes up and finds a conscience one morning soon.
Here's info from his profile saying he gets jobs coming to you. He doesn't promise to get you an interview or anything but more visible but what does that matter if nobody's looking? What I'd like to know is if those who've given up their contact info have been hit with a lot of spam related to income opportunities . That would be a good way to generate an email marketing list to then promote and up-sell or rent to other marketers which is what's happening too on linkedin. For the record it's easily learned information on the web if you want to optimize your profile, resume link or anything else and its free.
You can see he's been at this internet marketing stuff for a year, probably when his recruiting ran dry, like many of us. You can see his main interest is marketing. It's not getting anyone a job or helping any company fill it's positions, which is what recruiters do. So quit calling yourself a recruiter, let's just call an ace an ace... you're marketing info and leads, and this senior job seeker 'market' is the hot ticket item. I'm not making that up, he says it himself.
If you look at his profile ad lines below you'll see he considers senior job seekers a 'revenue stream" and he himself the source of their revenue if they partner with him. Disgusting really.
He's also training social media assistants... that's probably the people running his shill campaign every morning. No stone unturned in his ruse.
Greig Wells
Get Jobs Coming Inbound to You on LinkedIn & Google >>> Go Now to www.BeFoundJobs.com
- Location
- Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida Area
- Industry
- Staffing and Recruiting
- Current
- Get Jobs Coming Inbound to You by Going Here Now at www.BeFoundJobs.com
- Past
- Recruiter| Social Media Coach | Recruiter Trainer at iRepresent Recruiting
- Professional Services Recruiter | Corporate Recruiter at Pegasystems
- Technical Recruiter | Job Search Coach | Resume Writer at Nexaweb
- Education
- Bentley University
- Recommendations
- 14 people have recommended Greig
- Connections
- 500+ connections
- Public Profile
- http://www.linkedin.com/in/greigwells
Summary
Connect with me on LinkedIn using greig_wells@yahoo.com
All invitations to connect welcome, no IDK.
Follow Me on Twitter To Get All My Best Tips For FREE
Twitter.com/GreigWells
@GreigWells
I am looking to connect with Job Seekers to help them Be Found on Google and LinkedIn. Free info on my blog http://Blog.BeFoundJobs.com
I am hiring and training Social Media Virtual Assistants.
Check out my next Free live webinar on Social Media Marketing for Business at http://socialmediamagic.com/schedule.html
All invitations to connect welcome, no IDK.
Follow Me on Twitter To Get All My Best Tips For FREE
Twitter.com/GreigWells
@GreigWells
I am looking to connect with Job Seekers to help them Be Found on Google and LinkedIn. Free info on my blog http://Blog.BeFoundJobs.com
I am looking to partner and joint venture with job boards, bloggers, and LinkedIn Leaders whose target audience is Senior Job Seekers I can help you get a new revenue stream.
I run a coaching club for entrepreneurs and speak on Social Media including LinkedIn, Facebook, & Twitter focused on creating a lead generation and doing it in the least amount of time. The club is invite only but open to all of my LinkedIn connections. To join send me an email request.
I am hiring and training Social Media Virtual Assistants.
Check out my next Free live webinar on Social Media Marketing for Business at http://socialmediamagic.com/schedule.html
Specialties
I specialize in generating inbound leads using Social Media for job seekers and businesses.
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Experience
Get Jobs Coming Inbound to You by Going Here Now
http://www.linkedin.com/search?search=&sortCriteria=R&keepFacets=keepFacets&company=www%2EBeFoundJobs%2Ecom¤tCompany=co&goback=%2Efps_%22Greig+Wells%22_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_*1_Y_*1_*1_*1_false_1_R_true_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2_*2
Internet industry
2009 – Present (1 year)
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There are so many of these there's no way to keep on top of every one but if you get the general concept you can start to smell them for what they are before wasting too much time or giving them your email info.
Another repeat poster turned out to be directing traffic to an executive job site, or so it seemed. What I found when researching the site was an old company that changed names to protect the guilty and start again, doing the same 'service' to the unemployed, as it had been plagued with complaints for rip offs and misleading tactics. They simply changed their name and website to come out of the woodwork claiming to have access to executive level positions using a cheesy site that required your contact info to see the positions. Once inside they didn't have anything of their own, just links to job boards available for free all over the web and the upshot is they are selling the same software services that got them hammered with online complaints before. I didn't dig into their legal issues if they'd gone that far, but I did find out who they originally were.
I know this because there's tools online that allow you to check out the history of a website to see what the content was years ago and Poof! there it all was. So steer clear of Executive Search Online, or any of these names I've copied from the IP search I did each time these jokers reappeared to advertise.
Below is my posted comment to their ad saying they had executive level positions and hurry up to see them, be sure to send your resume blah blah. This phony shill profile thrown together just for the purpose of promotion, advocating their jobs which was posted in a job seeker group, a target market who can't afford to be ripped off, not that any of us can but you know what I mean.
My Comment- . I thought this wording and hype about exec level jobs being
available and the salary lure seemed familiar so I went to the archives and
to an online search and found this.
The link takes you to Job Market Contacts.com where they do their best not
to identify themselves but in the fine print you're held to arbitration in
Denver CO which is where the last scam company was based though the ip reg
was in PA; notice same IP and phone and addy- then notice the original company was
called McKenzie Scott which I located by running a way back on the domain ..
a groovy tool to find out what a site looked like historically... so run a
search on McKenzie Scott and see what kind of service they provided, it was
a resume mill and false promises mill. They best beware of the new laws by
the FTC on those who take advantage of job seekers in this critical time.
http://ftc.gov/opa/2010/02/bottomdollar.shtm
I ran an IP search and found it to be consistent with the former website
Here's the current ip info:
Current Registrar:NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
IP Address:74.63.136.87 (ARIN & RIPE IP search)
Record Type:Domain Name
Server Type:Indeterminate
Lock Status:clientTransferProhibited
Visit AboutUs.org for more information about JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
AboutUs: JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
Registrant:
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Domain Name: JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
Administrative Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
f75af3pk3w4@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Technical Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
f75af3pk3w4@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Record expires on 24-Jul-2012
Record created on 24-Jul-2006
Database last updated on 25-Jun-2009
And here's the initial info I found about the company before they changed
their name to protect the guilty:
Administrative Contact : Career Advisory Network, Inc.
rb8f93c22q7@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459 Drums, PA 18222 US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Technical Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
fh93v2jf36w@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM care of Network Solutions PO Box 459 Drums,
PA 18222 US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Record expires on 20-Sep-2012
Record created on 21-Sep-1998
Database last updated on 25-Aug-2009
Domain servers in listed order: Manage DNS NS1.CAREERADVNET.NET
74.63.136.116 NS2.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.117 NS3.CAREERADVNET.NET
74.63.136.118
This url is what the site showed on July 14th 2006 when they called
themselves McKenzie Scott as shown here-
http://web.archive.org/web/20060714220237/http://executivesearchonline.com/
And here's the complaints on them show the same CO address
http://www.complaints.com/2007/november/26/ITS__McKenzie_Scott_ripoff_155235.htm
I strongly suggest anyone considering giving your business to the site check
out the complaint at the link above for a good idea of who you're dealing
with.
Administrative Contact : Career Advisory Network, Inc.
rb8f93c22q7@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459 Drums, PA 18222 US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Technical Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
fh93v2jf36w@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM care of Network Solutions PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222 US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Record expires on 20-Sep-2012
Record created on 21-Sep-1998
Database last updated on 25-Aug-2009
Domain servers in listed order: Manage DNS NS1.CAREERADVNET.NET
74.63.136.116 NS2.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.117
NS3.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.118
http://www.complaints.com/2007/november/26/ITS__McKenzie_Scott_ripoff_155235.htm
Interesting tools available to search out domains including a way back
machine that shows you archives of domain pages from years back.. I ran
executivesearchonline.com and started leafing through.
This url is what the site showed on July 14th 2006 called themselves
McKenzie Scott as shown here-
http://web.archive.org/web/20060714220237/http://executivesearchonline.com/
And here's the complaints on them show the same CO address
http://www.complaints.com/2007/november/26/ITS__McKenzie_Scott_ripoff_155235.htm
Current Registrar:NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
IP Address:74.63.136.87 (ARIN & RIPE IP search)
Record Type:Domain Name
Server Type:Indeterminate
Lock Status:clientTransferProhibited
Visit AboutUs.org for more information about JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
AboutUs: JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
Registrant:
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Domain Name: JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
Administrative Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
f75af3pk3w4@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Technical Contact :
Career Advisory Network, Inc.
f75af3pk3w4@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com
ATTN JOBMARKETCONTACTS.COM
care of Network Solutions
PO Box 459
Drums, PA 18222
US
Phone: 570-708-8780
Record expires on 24-Jul-2012
Record created on 24-Jul-2006
Database last updated on 25-Jun-2009
from their site under general
This Web Site is based in Denver County, Colorado. The Company makes no
claims that the Materials are appropriate or may be downloaded outside of
the United States. Access to the Materials may not be legal by certain
persons or in certain countries. If you access the Web Site from outside of
the United States, you do so at your own risk and are responsible for
compliance with the laws of your jurisdiction. This Agreement is governed by
the internal substantive laws of the State of Colorado, without respect to
its conflict of laws principles. Jurisdiction for any claims arising under
this agreement shall lie exclusively with the state or federal courts in
Arapahoe County, Colorado. If any provision of this Agreement is found to be
invalid by any court having competent jurisdiction, the invalidity of such
provision shall not affect the validity of the remaining provisions of this
Agreement, which shall remain in full force and effect. No waiver of any
term of this Agreement shall be deemed a further or continuing waiver of
such term or any other term. Except as expressly provided in a particular
"Legal Notice," or Software License or material on particular Web pages,
this Agreement constitutes the entire Agreement between you and the Company
with respect to the use of Web Site. Any changes to this Agreement must be
made in writing, signed by an authorized representative of the Company.
My comment to their post on LinkedIn August 4th
Again, you should never have to give up your personal info to see a job description. If they had them, they'd gladly show you because that would cause you to WANT to give your resume and make it easier for them to earn the fee for recruiting and filling the position.
This is a marketing ploy to put you on a prospect list for sale to those promoting such opportunities or for use themselves for a get rich deal or home based business without your knowledge or permission. The site is senior exec related, they're pushing a hot button to get you to do what they want without any real identity, not even a fake pic for the profile this time.
Don't be fooled, make these predators find another place to scam people.
• Read the info on this link... http://www.complaints.com/2007/november/26/ITS__McKenzie_Scott_ripoff_155235.htm
Here's the start of the complaint..
ITS
Denver, Co 80237
US
I would like to make everyone aware of a company based in Denver that engages in fraudalent inducement to enter a contract.
ITS Family of Companies, a.k.a DBP Executive Search, McKenzie Scott, Job Market Access Center, Americas Job Network, Career Transitions and USA Job Market with address 7979 E Tufts Avenue Parkway, Suite 1400, Denver, CO 80237 and telephone number 303-357-3980, has a long list of complaints against it filed all over the United States because it is Internet-based.
ITS bills itself as "A Better Way to Find the Right Job" and "The Professional Job Changing System."
Read the rest at the url above.
There's a bevy of info and Interesting tools available to search out domains including a way back machine that shows you archives of domain pages from years back.. I ran executivesearchonline.com and started leafing through.
This url is what the site showed on July 14th 2006 called themselves McKenzie Scott as shown here-
http://web.archive.org/web/20060714220237/http://executivesearchonline.com/
And beyond that their privacy terms are very adamant to clear them of any damages arising from viruses etc among many other things and this admission of using you for marketing etc is asking to be spammed:
Section 10. User Information
The Company may use the information it obtains relating to you, including your IP address, name, mailing address, email address and use of the Web Site, for its internal business and marketing purposes and may disclose the information to third parties for such purposes.
http://executivesearchonline.com/site.pages/info-copyright.html
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Administrative Contact : Career Advisory Network, Inc. rb8f93c22q7@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM care of Network Solutions PO Box 459 Drums, PA 18222 US Phone: 570-708-8780 Technical Contact : Career Advisory Network, Inc. fh93v2jf36w@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com ATTN EXECUTIVESEARCHONLINE.COM care of Network Solutions PO Box 459 Drums, PA 18222 US Phone: 570-708-8780 Record expires on 20-Sep-2012 Record created on 21-Sep-1998 Database last updated on 25-Aug-2009 Domain servers in listed order: Manage DNS NS1.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.116 NS2.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.117 NS3.CAREERADVNET.NET 74.63.136.118
http://www.complaints.com/2007/november/26/ITS__McKenzie_Scott_ripoff_155235.htm
Interesting tools available to search out domains including a way back machine that shows you archives of domain pages from years back.. I ran executivesearchonline.com and started leafing through.
This url is what the site showed on July 14th 2006 called themselves McKenzie Scott as shown here-
http://web.archive.org/web/20060714220237/http://executivesearchonline.com/
This thing is a collection of resumes at your own risk open to anyone and has no jobs in their hands to recruit for from what I see.
People, recruiting efforts for the level of positions this is promoting is not handled like this with the cheesy looking presentation. They list a myriad of search engines or links to job sites and since they do career coaching and all that, you're grist for their mill.
Found on the web
ITS, McKenzie Scott ripoff
ITS
Denver, Co 80237
US
I would like to make everyone aware of a company based in Denver that engages in fraudalent inducement to enter a contract.
ITS Family of Companies, a.k.a DBP Executive Search, McKenzie Scott, Job Market Access Center, Americas Job Network, Career Transitions and USA Job Market with address 7979 E Tufts Avenue Parkway, Suite 1400, Denver, CO 80237 and telephone number 303-357-3980, has a long list of complaints against it filed all over the United States because it is Internet-based.
ITS bills itself as "A Better Way to Find the Right Job" and "The Professional Job Changing System."
It created "technology's first breakthrough in the job hunting field...our fully guaranteed service can make job hunting much easier saving you weeks and months of time and helping get you a far better job than you could ever do on your own."
They represent themselves as former HR Directors IT Directors and Marketing Directors for Fortune 500 companies who know the job hunting market and its requirements very well having done "tens of thousands of campaigns." People are told they can only reach 10% of the job market on their own. ITS reaches 96% because it has access to the hidden (non-listed) job market and emerging jobs. The process is as follows:
Develop a Marketing Campaign: The client is assigned a Marketing Campaign Director to write cover letters and resumes tailored to each client. "Our plans are normally targeted at making your phone ring at least 25 times. That's the key to getting 3 or 4 good offers to come through at the same time."
They identify the client's strengths and transferable skills, downplay liabilities and build the client's appeal in new industries to increase marketability. Fact: The unique marketing materials are boilerplate, standardized documents. The marketing plan is merely a computer generated regurgitation of the information the client provides.
Distribution: The cover letter is faxed to 10,000 employers, recruiters, venture capitalists, board members and decision makers. "We place your credentials with your best and highest probability prospects." The client is encouraged to read press releases of various companies to identify lead opportunities (this is the hidden job market) that have not been posted as job openings and send the cover letter and resume themselves. Fact: The database distribution is not updated and the materials are sent blindly to employers who do not solicit them. Moreover, the client has no way of knowing how many distributions were actually sent.
JMAC: A subsidiary of ITS, it is an online service that purports to find every single job posting on the Internet making it easier and more efficient for the client to look for jobs. Fact: JMAC pulls job listings from only a handful of other websites such as Monster, HotJobs, etc. that the client can access for free.
ITS provides all of this for an up-front fee of thousands of dollars. They offer the following guarantees:
"We back every step of our service with the strongest possible guarantees. For anyone we accept as a client, this eliminates any risk....placing all the risk on our firm and how we perform for you.
These include an unconditional money back guarantee on every marketing plan...
...an unconditional money back guarantee on the resumes we create for you...
...an ongoing satisfaction guarantee regarding everything we present...
...and a performance guarantee if you don't get a suitable situation within 90 to 120 days.
We provide these to make sure that our worldwide clients are totally comfortable using our services."
An Internet search of keywords McKenzie Scott+ITS+complaints yields thousands of complaints filed and posted by people from all over the United States.
All of the complaints cite the company has grossly overpriced and underperformed on their service, continues to misrepresent the capability of such service, and does not keep service commitments.
Moreover, they allege a bait-and-switch practice that is very common at the company to induce clients to sign the contract. All of the complainants received less than 1% return on the distributions and when they asked for a refund, they were told none would be offered because the satisfaction guarantee only entails a new distribution and marketing campaign make-over.
I believe the fraudulent inducement pertains to the money back guarantee. Monies are refunded only if the client does not approve the marketing materials BEFORE they are distributed. How are these people to know if these materials will work and get them interviews? They are encouraged to trust the "professionals" at ITS. The timing of the guarantee ensures that ITS' poor performance will not be challenged and no refunds will be given.
From: Message Author (click here to email author)
Date: Monday, 26-Nov-07 17:46:01 CST
And so concludes the report on the former McKenzie Scott group now developing another name to call themselves to take advantage of this bad job market and thousands of long term unemployed people to sell their worthless services to.
Whenever things are tough there are opportunists who will use it to their advantage, preying on those in desperation because that's their nature. If they're promising you a job through their pay for services you can report them to the FTC as they've got a new law and task force to protect those in this job crisis from being preyed upon. Check out the links at the right and keep your critical thinking cap on when reading posts on LinkedIn. Report the unscrupulous here.
