Vocus

Rather strange comments? This is my experience with Vocus. They tell you how great they are (as noted in this comment) and don't deliver any real value. They are constantly trying to sell something to me after I have told them their service sucks!! Their "training" is non-existent. I had 3 different account reps in a month!! They spoke in broken English, were difficult to understand and were unable to fix the issues!! I would NOT recommend them!! They have rebranded themselves Cision so watch out. Spend your $5,000+ somewhere else where you will get some real value, not hype.

We've been using Vocus for two years now and I would not recommend this service. We signed up because Vocus claimed they offer international media monitoring, but unfortunately that isn't the case. The only coverage the system really picks up is broadcast and online. They do not monitor any of our key trade publications (B2B company) and nothing on an international level. Also, their service is absolutely terrible. Every time I contact our account rep with a question, it takes multiple emails and phone calls to receive a response (nothing is resolved within a two week time period). When you call into the 800 number, you can get someone live but that support team can only answer questions about functionality of the database, not any type of question on media monitoring. Pros include: - PR database is pretty extensive. - Ability to distribute media pitches through the database. - Broadcast coverage. Cons include: - Must sign a year contract; will not offer a monthly subscription based service. - Terrible service. - VERY limited print monitoring. We had to pay for Burrelles to do the print monitoring (they are great!). - No international monitoring. - No radio monitoring. - Limited online coverage monitoring.

My one-year contract is almost up with Vocus and, unfortunately, I do not have a lot of positive things to write about my experience with the company. Great job convincing me to buy, but once you're in, radio silence. We had many promises made to our company and, in the end, delivery was late, often incomplete, and not impressive. During the courting period, our rep made promises about getting us national media hits through prominent media connections she had. We later learned that those connections didn't exist and she basically did exactly what we did: write press releases and pitch to mass media. Suffice to say that everything Vocus did for our company we could do ourselves for a lot less money and headache.

I signed a contract with Vocus that had three specific pay dates, could not have been more clear how payment were to be made. I gave them a debit card for the first payment and was offered a pre-authorization form to sign for the second and third, i declined and never signed it, payments would be taken over the phone when due. About 10 days prior to the second payments being due, Vocus ran my debit card for about $2100 and caused havoc in my bank account, overdraft fees, returned payment from other people that should have been paid, etc. They immediately apologized, swore it is not their practice to let financial info get passed to other employees and that the info would be shreded. I was angry and expressed how uncomfortable I was with this relationship but made my second payment as agreed in my contract. Then just two weeks after that another employee at Vocus tried to run my debit card for $4500! My bank thankfully rejected it. Now this was only 6 weeks into the subscriptions and the entire payment issue consumed a lot more time than I even used the program. At that time I told them I feel completely uncomfortable doing business with them, please refund and part was amicably. My bank gave me the option to pursue fraud charges and i declined. Now Vocus refuses to give back any money and sent me a bully letter for the balance. Their stance has been "we are a publicly traded company, we don't give refunds" I have tried to work out something rather than pursue legally but they are not responsive. This is not a relationship i wish to continue and i think I have enough cause to be reasonable asking for a refund, i do not trust this company and they breached the terms, not to mentioned many banking regulations, not me. I gave my card to one salesperson in the company and three different people have tried to run it weeks before payments are due. The theory being that people will just angry but simply accept it. If my company ever did this to anyone I would not expect them to want to do business and would be glad to try and save some face and refund them and go upon and beyond to win them back. They have no place in the small business community. I sent them all back up, contract, emails, bank records, the apologies for the first instance. They do not care, they have my money and they are keeping and and sent a demand letter for the balance and I have not logged into the program because all of this started just weeks after signing.

Having only 5 complaints for a company the size of Vocus is quite impressive. Especially when considering these are most likely to be from one of the many competitors Vocus has, spanning across digital marketing and PR. There are thousands of success stories out there to counter all of these rather strange comments. I'm sure not all companies have found great success working with Vocus, and perhaps one of the complaints is a genuine customer to didn't see the sales they were hoping for. Vocus gives you the tools and distribution network to achieve great things, but like anything in life it is certainly not a given.

The worst decision I ever made was to pick up the phone when someone from Vocus called. The moment they viewed me as a warm lead they put me on some list to continue to call me day and night and harass me into one of their products. Thankfully I never signed anything, or returned any contracts. You would think that would dissuade them from contacting me, nope. It's been over a year, and I still receive constant streams of emails and calls. Never, ever work with this company. They're the worst organization I've ever come across. Steer clear or they'll NEVER stop harassing you.

Bottom Line...... if you have any doubts about this.. then it is for a reason. That is your inner gut telling you to forget about this ***. I lost 4500.00 NO ROI at all.. this *** does not work!!! I did not even want to move forward but I sent my contract in and then I got a past due bill months later telling me they would pursue a judgment if I didn't pay. What kind of company locks you into a contract for subscription services anyway?!? Do not .. I repeat DO NOT take this overcharged service!!! If you do, at least you can say you were warned.... I am extremely pissed at them... it would definitely get physical if they were in my City!!!

After business hours on May 31, 2012, we faxed our copy of a contract, along with credit card information, to Vocus. Fax No. 301-459-****. This was for their "Vocus Marketing Suite - Bronze - Advanced Releases w/ 2 per month (Limit 1 Domain)" in the amount of $2,400.00, to be charged to our credit card over 3 months @ $800.00 per month. (They added $66.00 tax to the first invoice #74839, Sales Order #66304. Paying sales tax was never mentioned.) They also sent us an invoice #74840 for July's payment in the same amount, $866.00. They ALSO sent us a copy, dated Friday, June 1, 2012, of PayPal's "Perform Transaction - Result" showing "Transaction ID VXHA9B836E75, Authorization Code 00492G" in the amount of $866. This was--supposedly--done on their PayPal account (number not shown on receipt). Status was "Approved". The next day, I received a call from one of Vocus' competitors who warned me that Vocus would do nothing for us, promotion-wise, and he urged me to exercise my "3-day right-to-rescind" the contract. I did a number of internet searches and did find others for whom Vocus had "done nothing" and one very disturbing legal issue regarding children about their sales director. At 1:39am on June 3rd I sent Vocus a letter exercising my "3-day right-to-rescind", demanding a refund of any monies charged and rescinding my approval of further charges. I also called PayPal this morning, June 4th, regarding "Transaction ID VXHA9B836E75" (I had to speak to a live person to get the issue understood.) The PayPal agent told me that "Transaction ID VXHA9B836E75" was NOT a valid Transaction ID Number. So, that "receipt" sent to us from Vocus was a FRAUDULENT DOCUMENT, probably sent to us so we'd feel comfortable with our dealings with Vocus. I am hoping you can assist in getting my refund of the $866.00 charged me thus far. I demanded our money back and that no further charges be made to our card. I got an email from the salesman saying that they didn't give refunds ... so we are proceeding with our credit card company to do a chargeback. If anyone would like, I will email you a copy of Vocus' fraudulent PayPal receipt. foodstr22(at)spamcop.net (remove the brackets and use the real @ symbol) Bruce Hopkins http://www.internet-grocer.net 903-356-**** Vocus' actual details are: Vocus, Inc. 12051 Indian Creek Court Beltsville, MD 20705 301-459-**** Salesman's email: rymartin@***.com cc's sent to: fmoghis@***.com bhayes@***.com