I wish this were as simple as paying money for advertising and not getting results. As small business owners, we all experiment with advertising. But this advertising isn't advertising. It's a complete scam. Cloud Nine has a machine, for lack of a better word, that spews random Internet addresses at your site. They say the addresses belong to people who've clicked your link after putting in key search words that you've bought for $1,000 a pop for six months. Only people who have downloaded their toolbar (as they have you do during the demo) will see your ad when they enter those key words. They say 21 million people have downloaded the toolbar, a sizeable number, but it's only their advertisers who have been suckers enough to download the toolbar. Downloading this toolbar enables you to see your company at the top of Google when your dream key word is entered. You can't even find this toolbar on the Internet. My only thinking is they unleashed some virus in the form of a tool bar to 21 million unsuspecting computer users. But their pattern of lying makes me think me and many other scammed businesses are the only ones who have this toolbar. I visited Cloud Nine in Las Vegas and their address listed on their web site is false. They convinced me that some major players in my industry had bought their advertising, lying at a key moment during a high-pressured sale. Turns out to be a lie. I put in a key word and up popped a company whose owner never heard of Cloud Nine. So they replaced that professional's web site with one of their sham websites. Their testimonials are all linked to sham web sites. These clowns have an answer for everything. Don't believe a thing they say. I hope writing this has helped someone avoid making the costly mistake I have.
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