Consumer Advisory: Caveat Emptor (Buyer Beware) For Indie Authors Using "Book Tweep & Ebook Promoter"

Hello All,

During this era of what seems to be a second revolution of the printing press by means of the digital Internet. The rise of Independent Authors or Indie Authors has exploded from the blogs to the ebook to paperbacks. I count myself amongst them riding this current societal trend for the last decade or so. This period reminds me of the gold prospectors of the 19th century California 49'ers. Where in American History tens of thousands of men went to the Western United States particularly California to mine for gold. In the process causing horrendous environmental damage as the technique of strip mining came into the modern age.

Aside from this only a minority of gold prospectors ever struck rich veins of gold. Be it as dish panners at a river bed or stream or deep in the belly of unstable mine shafts. Of those that struck it rich most pissed away their new economic wealth having never before experienced it so quickly. In parallel we the Indie Authors have found ourselves in a similar fervor to date. By hoping for our works to strike gold and to develop a reputation of prestige in such a vocation or calling of the heart and soul. Much like the historical American 49'ers of Californian 19th century era. The Outfitters as the logistical suppliers that made a killing hand over fist equipping those gold miners and prospectors. These small business operators from the reputable to the fly by night selling defective gear and equipment. Which sometimes were sold as unneeded equipment for the task at hand occurred wholesale in that society.

Unfortunately today is an unusual entry from my characteristic self. Where I offer spiritual wisdom by means of inspiration and empowerment and my innovative conceptual designs as solutions for an endless tomorrow. This blog entry post is a Caveat Emptor (Buyer Beware) advisory for Independent Authors as consumers of online social media book marketing. From two particular websites apparently owned by the same outfit. They are "Booktweep.com & Ebook Promoter" (bookpromo.net) what follows is my opinion and experiences with this online small business seemingly based out of India. (India is my guess since "bookpromo.in" redirects to "bookpromo.net")

Below is my personal experience and may not be indicative of other customers past or present. However their customer service was basically non-existent when it came to responding to my customer email inquiries. This is my story first dealing with "Ebook Promoter" online they friended me on Twitter offering their online social media marketing services for Indie Authors. A few weeks later I checked them out and it appeared legitimate from a cursory glance. I subscribed for the monthly subscription of $9.99 US via Paypal.com. The account was tied to a "Mr. Durgesh Pratap" which later on turned out to be by my speculation a remote account that was seldom attended by anyone.

I set up my order for their Twitter, Facebook, etc... social media marketing of one of my books. I received an auto-responder that my order was received and a 2nd email from Paypal that my payment was made and I had set up a monthly subscription to "Mr. Durgesh Pratap". Two days go by and no response. I shrugged it off and waited a full week and started to get concerned. I emailed the customer service email of: jaydpromo@gmail.com and my message was never acknowledged like it went into a black hole. Two weeks go by figuring I was screwed out of my $9.99 US. I attempted something creative I messaged all the Twitter accounts by private message for help. None responded, I then came across one that auto-responded with an email link which I followed that link to a email that did work! It came from "Book Tweep", which at the time back in August of this year 2015 "Book Tweep" was part of "Ebook Promoter" service. (It seems there is a secondary market of buying and selling Twitter accounts at least or I presume there is such a practice that have large followings?)

I sent a partially desperate and embittered email to "Book Tweep" asking for their company to honor the $9.99 US I paid upfront. I didn't receive a response by email, but within two days or so my marketing Tweets began appearing. At first it was by 5 Twitter book marketing accounts I didn't fully recognize, minus the lone @BookTweep account I did recognize. This went on for a period of two weeks time until towards the end I was only being Tweeted by 2 of their accounts.

It seemed that the "Ebookpromo.net" was a derelict website since all of their Testimonals were from 2013. That I noticed at first but didn't think anything of it by assuming they were still in business. Also all the social media icons in the upper right hand side of their website are presently outdated and/or are bad links. I had subsequently canceled my Paypal monthly subscription with "Ebook Promoter" shitty service. I received only about $5 dollars worth of service from a $9.99 US rate I paid for a months time.

Thinking to myself I chalked this up to a bad experience I moved on away from these amateurs. A week or two later I noticed "Book Tweep" broke off from "Ebook Promoters" with their own service of $8.99 US a month. The "Ebookpromo.net" website also got slightly updated since losing the "Book Tweep" Twitter account and a few others. The new "BookTweep.com" website is very sleek and intuitive in its presentation compared to "Ebookpromo.net". Knowing that "Book Tweep" gave me a honored pro-rated amount after I reached out for help from them. I sent them an email asking if I signed up to their newly offered service would they cover my 3 books on a rotating basis for the one monthly subscription. I received a response with an affirmative that they would do so.

So I signed up to "Book Tweep" thinking there was no former association with "Ebook Promoter" that later on proved to My Mistake once again. I paid up front my $8.99 US for my first month installment and in a day or so my Tweet's from their 3 Twitter accounts began marketing my one book. I again assumed that my other 2 books would begin to appear in my marketing Tweets. They didn't after the first week and so I sent a follow-up email asking why and never got a response. The service continued until day 28 of this first month and my marketing book Tweets stopped without notification.

I didn't realize this had happened since I had another company also tweeting my books. So my Twitter account Notification column was constantly flooded with alerts. I paid my 2nd monthly installment of $8.99 not realizing the service stopped cold turkey on day 28 of the first month of tweets. Two weeks go by and I look at my Twitter Notification alert column and these folks dropped me without an email or a refund. I sent a polite but firm email asking for a full refund of my 2nd installment of the monthly subscription. Again I never received a response, it's like emailing a black hole!

This time I started a dispute with Paypal to get my money back which Paypal uses a two tier process for customer / merchant refunds. The first stage is disputes which is hashing it out with the merchant or seller and the 2nd stage is a claim. After the 1st week I escalated my Paypal dispute to a claim. One thing I failed to mention is that the "Book Tweep" Paypal account is the identical "Mr. Durgesh Pratap" nobody home customer service outfit. I later concluded that "Book Tweep" was a spin-off by a "Mr. Jay D." (perhaps Mr. Drugesh?). Another two weeks go by as a Paypal status claim and it seems the "Drugesh Pratap" account never responded to Paypal claims staff is my speculation. I was awarded as a refund by Paypal my 2nd installment of  $8.99 US, which I canceled the monthly subscription with "Book Tweep" a week earlier.

By the look of it both "Book Tweep & Ebook Promoter" have customers via their Twitter account feeds and affiliate Twitter accounts. I hope those are happy customers, but in my case I was screwed twice without the respect of being responded in any of my initial and follow-up emails. So be careful fellow Indie Authors in using their social media book marketing services. Another item before I close their customer service weblink of http://jaydpromo (.com) (Don't Use the Link, my Norton Anti-Virus blocked it as a Web Attack). That is listed in their Paypal invoice when you first sign up to both "Book Tweep & Ebookpromoter". Leads to a fake customer support scam alert that my anti-virus of Norton spared me from on my PC computer. So food for thought from this bad actor outfit based out of India at least in my personal experience.

(* I searched via Linkedin.com for "Mr. Durgesh Pratap" and several Indian names appeared. So it seems this is a common name in some respects. Please forgive me if your duplicate name appears here from someone else in social media marketing eliciting a poor reputation from my perspective.)

Gems of Opportunity: Social Media Concept: "How To Beat Twitter With Blast It!"

Hello All,

Today's social media business model concept could be employed by Twitter to a degree. Since Twitter hasn't to this point experimented with a voluntary subscriber or one time fee pay scheme for regular users. As a source of additional revenue for the company aside from what they're doing already with advertisers.

This conceptual design also nearly dove tails onto the one I had shared last month. Which was the "Telecommunications Industry Concept: The Smart Pager (Beeper) Redux" . Since a service that is based off of the SMS (Short Message Service) is an ideal cross promotion for a smart digital beeper to utilize. A Twitter App could merely be developed by the company for users to download onto a smart digital pager. (otherwise come pre-installed onto the device itself).

Back in September 21st, 2009 on this blog site I posted a marketing campaign conceptual design. Based off the "Jackson Five" song of Rockin Robin it is a no brainer for Twitter to pursue. Here's the link to my blog entry back then "Ad Concept: Twitter Advertisement Campaign" .

Now back to the concept at hand today much as how "MySpace" was usurped by "Facebook" in the pioneers of social media. One day another social media platform could overtake "Twitter" at its own game. I call this so far fictitious social media platform as "Blast It!". Twitter has by design constricted itself to the SMS limit of 140 characters per Tweet. That restriction is a throwback from the 1990's or literally the last century. Recall my last month concept regarding Smart Pagers (Beepers) well the 1990's was the era when beepers were the predominant form of letting someone know you called. Ironically today hospitals, physicians, and certain law enforcement departments still utilize pagers today for an area wide alert signal.

My idea for "Blast It!" would upend the artificial ceiling of the 140 SMS digital character limit per Tweet. Much as I stated in the first paragraph of this blog entry Twitter could pursue an optional subscription package of incentives or a one time upgrade fee for users. To set a new limit per tweet beyond the 140 character limit message of the antiquated SMS era.

Nonetheless "Blast It!" would shrug off such a SMS vestige by blasting away such Tweet or micro-messaging limits in text. Before Twitter there were and still are "Instant Messengers" such as: AOL, Yahoo, ICQ, and X-Fire. The latter one was popular for gamers, but never fully recovered after it was sold off to Viacom in 2006. My proposed social media platform would automatically start off all Tweets at an incremental limit of 420 (3x140) digital characters. At triple the amount of today's Twitter service provides. Such a service could also allow users to have a message feed from Twitter of their personal account onto the "Blast It!" service. To rub it in the comparison in message sizes per Tweet and per Blast.

At the time I wrote this conceptual design business model was back in early November 2014. Before the FCC (Federal Communication Commission) ruling on Net Neutrality most recently regarding throttling. Throttling was the tactic ISP's (Internet Service Providers) wanted to utilize to charge for higher rates of transmission speeds as gate keepers. The reason I am bringing this up was that my concept of such a social media company would throttle free users after a set limit of Blasts per day (24 hour period). Perhaps as little as after the first 15 Blast messages a day a free user would be throttled with a delay timer per their next set of messages. This was to encourage Silver and Gold tier voluntary subscriber plans to take hold as a source of revenue for such a company.

These proposed monthly subscriber plans of Silver and Gold would be billed annually. Making free accounts in effect a Bronze plan user. However all accounts would be able to send still images and video cross-linking in their messages. With whatever else comes standard today in custom settings and lists set-up by a user. Next comes the upgrades as voluntary one time fee's where the "Blast It!" social media platform. Can elect to offer extensions in message character limits to both free users and subscribers at 560 (4x140) and respectively 700 (5x140) digital character limits per message. However those that elect to pay the one time upgrade fee amount would first need to go through the 560 character limit. Before unlocking the 700 character limit per message which is a cheesy way to generate additional revenue on accounts with such incentives.

Those accounts that elect for the one time upgrades can have additional incentives rolled into the fee. Such as reduction of throttling if its a free account user in the Bronze tier line-up. Have for subscribers the option to have increased speeds than a nominal speed Silver plan tier account. At the 700 character limit the incentive of a text to audio speech recognition app can be offered. So instead of reading your messages you listen to them as another feature rich offering.

When such a service did launch commercially for all users it could offer a limited Platinum tier Lifetime plan. Billed at $140 US annually to rub it into Twitter for their SMS dinosaur limits. Maybe after every successful anniversary date such a social media platform milestone is reached. The Platinum service tier plan could be brought back up for users to partake of in a promotional rate.

The "Blast It!" social media conceptual platform is just a notion to be a direct competitor to Twitter. An Arch-Nemesis if you will with a wink and nod to their success, but taking their business model and super sizing it. Since when Twitter launched it didn't have an inkling on how to commercialize themselves. They had to rework their service just to become commercially viable for investors and stakeholders. Without the Linchpin of advertisers Twitter doesn't have any other source of general revenue at least for only the commercial accounts. The general population of regular accounts wouldn't have the incentives I'm listing here for the fictitious "Blast It!" platform. Maybe someone at Twitter should wise up before a young upstart beats you at your own social media game or business model. (Unless Twitter buys them out first)

Time will tell who will be the usurper to beat Twitter, just like Facebook bested MySpace.

Ivan "Atrayo" Pozo-Illas, has devoted 21 years of his life to the pursuit of clairvoyant automatic writing channeling the Angelic host. Ivan is the author of the spiritual wisdom series of "Jewels of Truth" consisting of 3 volumes published to date. He also channels inspired conceptual designs that are multi-faceted for the next society to come that are solutions based as a form of dharmic service. Numerous examples of his work are available at "Atrayo's Oracle" blog site of 11 years plus online. Your welcome to visit his website "Jewelsoftruth.us" for further information or to contact Atrayo directly. 

Ad Concept: Twitter Advertisment Campaign

Hello All,

After listening to an old song from the "Jackson 5" on a compact disc called "The Essential Michael Jackson" (Disc 1 of 2). The song being "Rockin Robin" sung by young "Michael Jackson". Got my mind wondering due to the song lyrics that this would be a great ad campaign for "Twitter".

By centering the visuals of the advertisement around the song lyrics. Which in turn as a form of cross-branding can be a homage to the late great "King of Pop".

Down below is the song lyrics:

Jackson 5 - Rockin' Robin Lyrics
----------------------------------------

He rocks in the tree tops all day long
Hoppin' and a-boppin' and singing his song
All the little birdies on Jaybird Street
Love to hear the robin go tweet tweet tweet

Rockin' robin, tweet tweet tweet
Rockin' robin' tweet tweetly-tweet
Blow rockin' robin
'Cause we're really gonna rock tonight

Every little swallow, every chick-a-dee
Every little bird in the tall oak tree
The wise old owl, the big black crow
Flappin' their wings singing go bird go

Rockin' robin, tweet tweet tweet
Rockin' robin' tweet tweetly-tweet
Blow rockin' robin
'Cause we're really gonna rock tonight
Yeah yeah

Pretty little raven at the bird-band stand
Told them how to do the bob and it was grand
They started going steady and bless my soul
He out-bopped the buzzard and the oriol

He rocks in the tree tops all day long
Hoppin' and a-boppin' and singing his song
All the little birdies on Jaybird Street
Love to hear the robin go tweet tweet tweet

Rockin' robin, tweet tweet tweet
Rockin' robin' tweet tweetly-tweet
Blow rockin' robin
'Cause we're really gonna rock tonight

Pretty little raven at the bird-band stand
Told them how to do the bop and it was grand
They started going steady and bless my soul
He out-bopped the buzzard and the oriol

He rocks in the tree tops all day long
Hoppin' and a-boppin' and singing his song
All the little birdies on Jaybird Street
Love to hear the robin go tweet tweet tweet

Rockin' robin, tweet tweet tweet
Rockin' robin' tweet tweetly-tweet
Blow rockin' robin
'Cause we're really gonna rock tonight

------------------------------------------------

This song is practically a head scratcher why the developers of "Twitter". Haven't gone this route by obtaining a license from the Jackson estate to utilize this old "Jackson 5" song.

It's a no brainer for an advertising campaign through various forms media devices.