My tl;dr statement: AVOID Wishpond Technologies at all costs. I would provide their URL here so you know who to look for to avoid, but I don’t want to give them the link. Instead, if you want to see what they are about – and you shouldn’t – they are at www dot wishpond dot com.
Background
In October 2024, I was contacted on a cold call by someone from Wishpond Technologies to talk about their marketing lead generation platform and to see if I was interested in it for my photography business. It sounded interesting, and I am always looking for effective ways to get my business name “out there” to be found. I contacted them back, and had a really solid meeting with their salesman, Cory.
In my meeting with Cory, I explained that I have a media business in which I do corporate branding, photography, and website design and development for clients…clients who may benefit from an automated lead generation platform. So I signed on under an “Agency Agreement” whereby I could use their platform to provide these services to my clients. I agreed to test it out with my Photography business as the test case to learn the platform under and to see how it worked. We agreed to do that for 3 months.
It was all made legal with a contract, which is expected and appreciated. The contract included:
- $1,000 initial onboarding and setup
- $180 per month for platform licensing x 6 months
- $300 per month for active online lead generation campaigns to include landing pages and a pop-up ad on my website x 6 months
- $XXX Whatever I wanted to budget for online ad spend, recommended to be $10 per day
This was expensive, but I signed up for it thinking at least 4 of my clients could benefit from this.
What I Was Signing Up For
- Initial setup and onboarding
- Training on how to use the platform
- Active lead generation campaigns in 11/2024, 12/2024, 1/2025 and if all went well, 2/2025, 3/2025, and 4/2025 during which I would run campaigns for a client
What I Got (or Didn’t Get)
November | Contract Item Not Delivered
I was offering a drawing for a free holiday family portrait session and 11×14 print for one lucky winner who signed up for my mailing list. It was crucial for this to run in November and December. They spent the entire month of November getting things set up and producing the graphics for the first campaign. No live ads, no leads generated.
December | Contract Item Delivered
They finally got the campaign set up which was decent, and it ran for the month of December. It generated just a handful of leads from advertising on Meta. Overall it was a disappointing result, but was what it was.
January | Contract Item Not Delivered
After the holidays, I switched the campaign to be for a free professional headshot portrait session…Start the new year with a new professional profile portrait. I tried to get them to build the ad artwork in December, but they didn’t. So, they spent all of January building the graphics and campaign.
Check Point
At this point, I evaluated the results so far. I had paid the initiation fee and the first 3 months of subscriptions. They only delivered 1 of the 3 months of services, and I indicated to them that I did not want to continue and as per plan, expressed in writing my wish to terminate the relationship. Fortunately, my credit card balance was nearing the low credit limit so they were not able to continue billing me for the services they were not delivering.
After a lot of ghosting and repeated attempts to get me to update my billing information, they finally came back saying they expected to honor the complete 6-month contract, and I needed to keep paying them another $1,440 plus the cost of ads. They only delivered 1 of 3 months of services, but they expected me to keep paying.
Negotiating
I was demanding a refund and to exit from the contract for lack of delivery on their part…breach of contract. They would not do that, and they dug in instead saying they would still provide delivery of the 2 months of past services and the 3 I had not paid for yet. I reluctantly agreed to continue for 2 months – February and March – to get what I had already paid for and be done with it.
February | Contract Item Partially Delivered
We spun up a new campaign since the new year had come and gone and the headshot hook wasn’t as compelling any longer. This time, I am offering a free senior portrait session…a $295 value. They delivered a landing page that I was to use with Meta advertising, but did not install a pop-up CTA form on my website. I had to create my own for that.
March | Contract Item Partially Delivered
Still no pop-up ad, and I was getting very little activity on my landing page campaign. I again indicated I wished to terminate and end the relationship. They again dug in and refused to end the contract despite only having delivered 1 full and 2 partial months of services instead of the 5 I was contracted for. Instead they offered me a discounted rate on continued services but still expect the full contract amount despite not delivering what they were contracted to deliver.
Next Steps
I have indicated my intent to file a lawsuit in this matter, and I have started that process in Small Claims Court. Unfortunately, the company is based in Vancouver, BC, so I must file my suit there. While I could probably attend any settlement conferences remotely, if it did go to trial, I would likely need to appear in person in Vancouver. Hardly worth it to do that without knowing I would get fees and expenses paid for, which I’m sure Wishpond is counting on.
Meanwhile, they billed me another $480 for February’s installment. I have demanded at least a discount to stop the bleeding per their negotiated offer, but as per usual, they are ghosting me and not responding. I fully expect they will bill me $480 x 2 more times despite not providing any services.
Lessons Learned/Confirmed
- Do not do business with companies in locations you aren’t able or willing to travel to in case you have a conflict.
- Do not ever count on the “promises” of the account management team. It’s only real if it’s in writing in the contract, period.
- Do not expect a company to do the right thing by their clients. They are in breach of contract, plan and simple, yet they refuse to engage to a rightful conclusion instead just continuing to bill me and not deliver any more services.
- Be willing to go to court…see point 1.
- There is a HUGE difference in competency between the account manager selling the service and the delivery and customer success teams “delivering” what you’re paying for. I would work with Corey again under different circumstances. The other team members…nope.
Want to win a Senior Portrait session? I’m still giving one away through the end of March at www.jeremydavisphotography.com