I applied for a job through Monster.com with these people because they advertised it as an entry level management position. It seemed kind of shady right from the beginning because the listing was semi-anonymous but I sent in my resume anyway.
When I went in for my "interview" they had me fill out a short form even though I had already sent in my resume and then told me this was just the first interview. They guy I talked to for this interview name dropped pro sports teams (like the Orlando Magic), national retail chains (like Home Depot), and restaurants. He claimed I'd be doing Business to Business (B2B) work and would be going out with one of their "account managers" for a day if I was selected for a second interview.
On the second interview day, I showed up early and waited in the lobby area where the secretary was and noticed she'd answer the phone with different names for the company depending on who she was talking to. I was already there so I decided to stay anyway even though I should have left as soon as I heard that. They introduced me to the "account manager" and was told we'd be promoting a spa. He was one of those highly out going guys who seemed like a sales person.
I still had no idea where we were really going but on the drive he tried using all these sales buzz words from crappy professional selling courses but he used them wrongly. I know this because I took a crappy professional selling course as an elective (it was worthy of its own rip off report). He showed my this book of promotions they had done, it was just a bunch of card stock coupon flyers in a binder all set up the same. He said we were going to canvas different commercial areas talking to managers about promoting the spa. The reality of the situation was totally different.
We were really just door to door sales people but instead of going to people's houses we were harassing them at their jobs. We got out of the car at a strip mall and went to each of the businesses and he did his sales pitch which was mostly lies. He presented himself as actually working for the spa and said the "VIP card" he was selling was "90% off" the price. It was more like 75% off but not really because the tip was not included. We walked to near-by strip malls and offices and continued the selling. He walked around with a bunch of checks and cash in his front pocket because he thought that made him look more credible for some reason. All it did was make him look like more of a scammer to all the people he talked to.
It was embarrassing, he'd pull on every door without caring what kind of business it was or if it was even a business. At one point the other employee from the company showed up for "training" from this guy too. They totally ignored the "No Soliciting" signs everywhere and as part of the training the lead seller told us to not apologize and just say something like "Excellent!" or "That's Perfect!" in response. This is the kind of douchbaggery I was subjected to for hours in the hot Florida sun over several miles of walking.
Eventually they started harassing offices of companies I might actually want to get a real job from some day so I got fed up managed to ditch them. We went into a slightly high end furniture store and they interrupted an employee on the phone trying to close a sale on furniture that was probably worth at least $5000. She basically told them to stop bothering her and talk to other employees further in the store. That's when I made my break for it.instead of following them, I turned around and walked out the door because I was already about 10 feet behind them at that point anyway and I knew they'd want to try to complete the sale instead of chasing me down.
The commercial area we were in was set up as a bunch of smaller buildings and paths not in a straight line so I was able to jog away and not be seen easily. I was on foot so I walked down the street and walked into a grocery store to cool down because I knew it was a place I could go in without being noticed by the employees and it was big enough to not be seen even if they happened to walk in there trying to sell more $40 pieces of card stock.
They managed to harass more than 50 businesses over the four hours I was with them (most of them with "No Soliciting" signs) and only made one $40 sale. It was the biggest waste of time ever. It was not Business to Business, not management, and not worth anyone's time. Don't ever go to an interview for these people and if you are a business, don't ever hire them to advertise for you because your company will end up looking really bad.
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