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Date Added: 6/18/2009
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Reviewer: Quintile
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28 users graded this
Community Grade
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Do you know about this service? Add a comment and earn 50 credits!
Service Description
StoresOnline is a storefront solution for Internet marketers wishing to have a online store. They offer several solutions that include web marketing, business services, Internet education and training and Ecommerce technology. StoresOnline puts on workshops/seminars that are highly targeted sales efforts to get people to part with their money in hopes of making lots of money online with a store. There is a Cease Order filed in the state of Utah.
Detailed Overview
StoresOnline is a solution service for Internet marketers who wish to have a storefront online. The solutions that are offered through StoresOnline include launching a store online, managing the online business, a comprehensive eCommerce and marketing service, customer support and training including Internet marketing strategies. The service categories include:
- Internet education and training
StoresOnline is also known as "iMergent". One marketing ploy that StoresOnline uses is to hold workshops where the entire process is explained beginning with the tools you need to make money online, to what is involved in owning a StoresOnline business. The workshop/seminar is a full day event, and it is easy for attendees to get swept up in all the fevered sales pitch that is presented. One attendee stated that there is so much material presented that it led to confusion. On the plus side, what is offered at StoresOnline is a complete package that for the exact same professional items elsewhere online can run you about $2,000 per online store. If you are a StoresOnline customer and you do not like your products or they don't sell well, you can wipe the store out and start again at no further charge; try doing that with other services. Although the workshop does provide a decent amount of content, not all of the content or strategies provided are sound strategies that work; some may even fringe on copyright law such as copying Websites and making a few changes.
StoresOnline has received the SSPA Award. This award is for service excellence. According to the SSPA Website, in order to receive the award, a company needs to provide ongoing high level of commitment to delivering world-class results in technical support and they are evaluated with a rigorous process to determine if they fit the criteria. The SSPA's advisory board members select those companies to be awarded.
Many of the reviews posted online and comments in forums about StoresOnline contain negative content such as the service is overpriced for the tools and services received, and that many say they scam those who sign up for service. One professional stated that the invitation to the seminar was full of typos and that the seminar only lasted 90 minutes.
Pricing at seminars can go something like this:
- $50 for the "buy-in", this is usually $200
- The "buy-in" gives the buyer the license to the Content Management System.
- The "Pro Version of the StoresOnline software is $3,600
- Hosting is $24.95 every month.
Many of those who attended the seminars complained of receiving free MP3 players that contained Asian-created interface and had a Trojan virus attached.
One online writer (Vaughn) found a "Cease and Desist Order from the state of Utah against StoresOnline according to Medicine Hat Media Website."
The Cease Order can be found here:
http://www.dfi.wa.gov/sd/orders/s-03-010-03-to01.pdf
The order is regarding a violation of the Business Opportunity Fraud Act of Washington by:
Imergent, Inc.: StoresOnline, Inc.: John J. Poelman; Brandon Lewis; Donald Danks; Charles Andrews; and their agents and employees. Case No. S-03-010.
Reputation
There are 395 reports to date found on the Ripoff Report Website regarding StoresOnline. Some of the reports are regarding Attorney General's offices from the state of Illinois, Utah,a class action suit in Canada and another class action lawsuit in California and many others (16 pages worth). In the Internet marketing forums, such as the Warrior Forum, there is much negative (scam) talk about StoresOnline including the fact that they had to change their name. They were formerly known as "Galaxy Mall". It was also brought up that if you do not cancel within 3 days of the seminar, you wouldn't be able to get out of the financial contract.
Domain "Whois"
The Whois information for a website lists the owner and their contact information. The Whois information for "StoresOnline" is public which is generally a good thing. This indicates the owner of this site has nothing to hide.
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14 of 15 users found this review helpful
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A horrible product
That is aimed at sucking the last penny out of you. Me and my wife lost so much due to this service.. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, is overpriced with this service, mainly because you pay so much and get virtually NOTHING in return. I attended their so-called "seminars". It was nothing professional and in the whole one hour and a half they didn't share ANY idea or way of making money, it was all big fluff and hype. The programs and services that this site offers are hyper-expensive and have absolutely nothing special in compared to similar tools that other, much more trusted and reliable companies host. When the service started making me some strange deals that required me to pay up to $4000, I quickly dismissed the idea and realized that this was not only a big waste of time, but a huge waste of money. They, of course, suddenly decided that they could make me a better deal for only $2000 but that was still overpriced for me. Besides, who cuts their price by half? I understood it was a big scam and that they were only looking to suck all your money out of you by any means possible. This is a horrible service and I strongly advise you to stay away from it. You are not going to earn anything from it, you will only lose big amounts of money for nothing! Don't get tricked by them!
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0 of 0 users found this comment helpful
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Money, Money, Money
I was one of the less fortunate people. I bought into the whole " you will be rich" theme and spent in excess of the $6000. After much research and more money I found that at every turn when you needed help it would cost more. DO NOT GET SUCKED IN BY THIS COMPANY. I actually went to their luncheon and still got swept into it. All the talk is just that talk no real substance.
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1 of 1 users found this comment helpful
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by silent1 on February 25, 2010 at 9:47 AM CST
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Don't even waste your time or money
StoresOnline is not even worth the time or the money. The tools and everything else that they supposedly give you for your monthly payment are just not worth it. There are so many other e commerce sites out there that cost a lot less, and you can totally customize the store the way you want to. All that fancy software and everything else that you paid big bucks for is not worth it. With a little bit of time and effort, you can build a nice store on your own. I am sorry that I tried it, as it costs a lot, and I felt that I certainly did not get my money's worth. If you want your own store, then spend some time searching for the right e commerce store. They are out there, you just have to look and a lot less expensive. I am glad that I was skeptical, and did not pay thousands of dollars like some others did.
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1 of 1 users found this comment helpful
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One of the great scams of my time
This would have to be one of the greatest scams that I have come across on the internet. Fortunately for me, I only bought my way into the very low levels of this scheme, so only lost a few hundred dollars, but I have heard of people losing thousands.
The scheme basically promised something that it didn't deliver. It said that it would provide a steady income stream for a seemingly insignificant start-up cost, but in actual fact did nothing of the sort.
Personally, I received barely any money from it, certainly not getting close to what I paid.
I would recommend you stay away, it really isn't worth it.
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0 of 0 users found this comment helpful
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by epic on December 3, 2009 at 2:50 PM CST
NeoBux - The most trusted PTC site!
Sign up here! www.neobux.com/
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I had to give up because I couldn’t afford to pay anymore
I would not recommend StoresOnline to anyone. They are charging a lot of money for hosting. At the beginning I received a free mp3. This is not worth a lot but it made me join StoresOnline. I was a member for 2 months. I had to give up because I couldn’t afford to pay anymore. I think they are very misleading because they do not mention the costs for the web server, the credit card processing fees and drop shipping fees. Unfortunately I didn’t earn any money. For me it was a waste of time and money. I would not recommend it to anyone!
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0 of 0 users found this comment helpful
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by stephany on November 25, 2009 at 5:10 PM CST
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Don't Waste Your Money!
I had a personal experience with StoresOnline, and the product they sold me was not how it was explained at the seminar! Fortunately I was able to obtain a refund, but I have read numerous bad reports across the internet from people who were taken for 100's and even 1,000's of dollars.
I am an internet marketer and have created just under 100 blogs and websites for FREE! I earn residual income through these sources and I did not pay one penny to start and maintain these sites. StoresOnline charges ridiculous fees, start-up costs and hosting fees for a program that even I found difficult to operate.
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1 of 1 users found this comment helpful
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Not much you haven't heard before
I found out about this site when I was invited to attend a seminar here in town on selling online; the main hook was that everyone who attended would get an mp3 player. That sounds fishy right off, just because places that have to promise you something like that to get you in the door probably don't have anything all that fantastic to sell in the first place. My scammer alert went off again when I saw the mp3 player pictured: it was clearly an iPod Shuffle, but the tiny text beneath the picture said that you would not be getting anything by Apple. I decided to go to the seminar anyway, because they couldn't scam me if I didn't buy anything off them, and it was a free lunch.
They did deliver on the free mp3 player, sort of; it's a tiny little 512 mb thing that's probably worth less than $10, but at least it was something. The actual info in the seminar was nothing new, certainly not if you've done any research on internet marketing before, and I was right: it was pretty much just a pitch to sign up for their stuff, which of course means a much-vaunted free trial with huge fees in the fine print.
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1 of 1 users found this comment helpful
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by 100indecisions on September 13, 2009 at 1:57 PM CST
I spent a semester in England; read about it (and my other travels) here.
I like to read and to give my opinions. Put them together and you get book reviews.
Get paid to blog!
PM me for an invite to a new site that's giving away easy points for swag.
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StoresOnline Pro Website Software - GOTCHA
At the orientation, they promise to market your webpage and NEVER tell you the upfront costs for the web server, the credit card processing fees, drop shipping fees, the extra website for blogging in order for people to rate your business, ghost websites to link to it. I was told it was guaranteed to market and make money. Well I tell you what, I've been up and running since March 2009 and haven't sold a single thing! So I quit paying for server and told the county to revoke my tax license. It's almost like you need $30,000 or something to get things up and running. It's extremely time consuming. What a rip-off!
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0 of 0 users found this comment helpful
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Waste of money!
I am a StoresOnline customer. They have been my Website host for almost 2 years. I have had 25 years of computer and internet experience. My business partner has been in the computer business for over 45 years! We thought, even though we knew this was a lot of hype, there was some meat in what they were selling and with our experience could make a go of it. And we knew the only area where we were weak was internet marketing and advertising. PMI quickly came along to fill that gap (so they said).
Our site has been fully operational for just under 2 years. The website management software used by Stores Online is not very intuitive and takes some practice, even for an experienced HTML/Javascript coder. It is also relatively simplistic with many drawbacks and restrictions. Internet marketing is the most important thing to get your site seen by buyers, and this is where they get you! You can have the most beautiful site in the world, but it is useless if no one will see it.
We trudged on, looking for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow as promised by the hype. Our site is now fully “optimized” for search engines (independently tested) and we have a great drop shipper.
Bottom line…If you really want a website, don’t go to Stores Online! Runaway from these leaches. Stores Online and PMI (especially) are the most loathsome and unethical people I have ever dealt with! PMI said they would teach me everything I needed to know about web marketing but their people don’t know the first thing about the subject and only make suggestions for you to “try”.
All the training you need can be found on the internet for free. Good website hosts are a dime a dozen. Stay away from anything having to do with Storesonline. Don’t be stupid like me. Save your thousands of dollars for a nice vacation when you get your site up somewhere else.
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1 of 1 users found this comment helpful
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by pete_ltd on August 31, 2009 at 12:47 PM CST
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StoresOnline has been GREAT!
I have been a SOL user for over two years. I purchased their 5 license package in May 2007 and my first web site was published February 2008. This is a very large complicated site and the undertaking would have been impossible without the help of the SOL support team. The SOL support people are very knowledgeable about the product and it's capabilities and for the most part do a very good job. It is true that using a template limits what "features" you can add but the overall business opportunity has been a good investment. I would recommend SOL to anyone who is willing to put some serious time and effort into their site development. This is not for those wanting to get rich quick.
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2 of 3 users found this comment helpful
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by magaskill on August 22, 2009 at 2:43 PM CST
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Ditto to what others have said - PLUS
We experienced the same as others have stated. Lost big money with StoresOnLine. Went into debt to get started. Then after you are in, you have to put out more money for your own "private coach". Since we didn't know anything about setting it all up, we again stupidly paid out more money for this coach. We put in hours & days trying to get our website setup. We were to have 6 websites. We got 2 setup; but NO sales. We finally got out of it - but had all that debt to pay off. Beware - when they come up with the philosophy about it is better to use someone else's money than your own = they mean put it on your credit card! We even fell for that line once again after this one. Now as soon as they mention that - I am off the phone with them.
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6 of 6 users found this comment helpful
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I admit it, I was a sucker too!
STAY AWAY! You get all wrapped up in the hype, and if you just look around a little bit you can find much easier and cheaper ways to do business on the internet.
It was amazing to me that I paid an extra $1000 for the payment processor, because it was so much easier and you were guaranteed to be accepted, which I was, however, once I got my site up and ready to go. They wanted a $500 reserve to hold in case I had some returns. My market was a very high return market, so they said. It was vitamins. They paid no interest on the money they held. Then I started getting my monthly statements from the processing company. $10 per month for a statement and $20 per month for the service. That's $30 per month for doing nothing! I had no sales. Plus the $24.95 per month to host. $60 bucks a month for the pleasure of doing business with them.
I took that site down, but I'm still having to pay $10 per month just to keep it.
I was oh so stupid. Please do not make the same mistake I did.
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7 of 7 users found this comment helpful
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by pmcinc on August 7, 2009 at 7:59 PM CST
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Waste of Time
My husband and I were invited to attend a "seminar" that was touted as Internet Sales Training. Before the first break we were becoming increasingly aware that there was no training to be had, it was all sales hype! Speakers made repeated references made to the beautiful free lunch we were going to be provided; after lunch more references to whether we (the group) were there for the meal or to make money. Had a sleazy feel after the first few times and almost as though they hoped to shame the attendees in a sale. Then there was the pressure to buy! A sales person stopped by 3 times asking financial questions. Even after being told we were not in a position to spend $3600, options for financing seem to miraculously open up. We found no value in the time spent and exited early to avoid further sales pitch. Do not recommend this to anyone!
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8 of 8 users found this comment helpful
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Stay Away From Storesonline
My husband and I made the grave error of purchasing three of the StoresOnline websites. The reason we were unable to purchase six of their sites (which is usually the requirement) is because instead of four thousand dollars, six sites would have cost us eight thousand dollars which we couldn't afford. But StoresOnline was being extra kind to us and told us they were creating a "special deal" selling us three websites on a payment plan.
StoresOnline came to our city offering a free sucker lunch and promises of a successful turn key business. After signing our lives away, it took me months to design my website. They offer support that is virtually worthless. The language barrier is a huge obstacle. They do not give you the tools to succeed as promised. When your site is launched, they charge you twenty five dollars a month to maintain it! When you are part of StoresOnline, they continually attempt to sell you private mentoring service. Of course, none of this is included in the thousands of dollars that you already spent. Your website doesn't even come with a payment processor. You guessed it, that's extra too!
So unless you have thousands of dollars and many, many hours of time to waste (not to mention blood, sweat, tears and advertising bucks) stay away from StoresOnline.
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9 of 9 users found this comment helpful
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by rcguenth on June 30, 2009 at 9:25 AM CST
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Ripoff with a capital R
I was enticed by an Ad on my Yahoo email to sign up for a conference in my area. I signed up and attend the conference. The conference was full of hype and by the end of the day I was signing up for three websites and placing it on credit for $4000. How foolish I was! Went back to a second conference on Friday to set up account, by Monday I decide not to bother with it; but it was too late. They only had a three (3)day money back guarantee; which they failed to tell anyone. I never got the three websites that they promised, just three certificates representing a site. Oh man! It took me three years to pay it off after showing up on my credit report as Delinquent. Tried to buy a house; but could because of this. Never again. Regardless of the number of disputes with the creditor and StoreOnline; they would never admit to their wrong. Money is the root of all Evil and Greed. Error on my part because I thought I could start my own business. And Greed on their part, because the don't care who they violate as long as they have get money in their pockets.
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12 of 12 users found this comment helpful
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by lsabdul on June 23, 2009 at 9:26 AM CST
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