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Thread: Hellopeter.com - more than meets the eye.

  1. #11
    just me duncan drennan's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by bullfrog View Post
    I really do like the idea of the site though and think the basic idea is good but don't like the idea as a small business owner that I would have to pay to sort out a customer issue that could have been sorted out directly. That being said I would most probably spend the money should I appear on hellopeter.com even though it goes against principal. I would do my best not to be put on hellopeter in the first place
    Well, to a degree, this is the kind of thing were blogs, and so on can help. You can use your own platform to explain the situation and the remedy. It may not be as high profile as Hello Peter, but it does allow you to respond on your own terms.
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  2. #12
    Platinum Member Chatmaster's Avatar
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    OK, I am going to make some ripples here, as I wish for this topic to be discussed properly and from all angles.

    hellopeter.com is a business extortion site.

    I am truly amazed that hellopeter has received the support it has until now. The business concept imo is a very good one but the fact that companies has to pay to register is a concept that borders the criminal. How on earth can any website or public forum require payment from any party to respond to complaints against them. What on earth is wrong here? Look at the complete website. Peter is clearly out on making money on natural consumers reactions. This has nothing to do with solving issues! Solving issues is just a natural marketing benefit for Peter. The concept is plain and simple to make money of the consumer and the normal human reaction to complain and the natural reaction of business to make it go away at any costs.

    I mean we have talked about these issues before on this forum, where people has a natural tendency for not taking responsibility for their actions. Also from a marketing point of view, what better way for Peter to get word of mouth going than to "resolve" issues. I say that in quotes because like most of us know, bad publicity can be used in many ways by business. But most businesses will pay money to just let it go away and give a nice response.
    Roelof Vermeulen (Entrepreneurship in large organizations)
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  3. #13
    Platinum Member Marq's Avatar
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    This has nothing to do with solving issues! Solving issues is just a natural marketing benefit for Peter. The concept is plain and simple to make money of the consumer and the normal human reaction to complain and the natural reaction of business to make it go away at any costs.
    Quite right!
    I have used this site a couple of times and not had any successful resolve. If fact my last complaint I posted three times with a BS answer every time. Did anybody really care? Doubtful!!

    Hello Peter is no more than a cheap help desk mechanism for these large corporates. Most of those that claim to respond do so on the basis that - we are sorry that you had a problem hope it is resolved. One goes around in circles and there is no sincere effort to really fix the problem.

    To complain one has to register with cell phone and email addresses - I would not be surprised if this site sells mail lists as well and keeps the spam world going.

    It would appear that another 'altruist' is not what he seems.

  4. #14
    Silver Member Eugene's Avatar
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    "hellopeter.com is a business extortion site"

    I quite agree - just wonder when a company with slam them with a nifty slander case...

  5. #15
    Site Caretaker Dave A's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Eugene View Post
    just wonder when a company with slam them with a nifty slander case...
    Hmm. You're the lawyer so I'll be guided by you on this. But I've kinda checked this out in respect of this site (The Forum SA) because in a way it has a similar exposure to this risk.

    One of the key crux points around the host's accountability for content is "pre-publication editorial control." Without it (and there is no obligation to excercise pre-publication editorial control), the issue of accountability on the part of the site moves towards traceability. And whilst that is possible (requirement fulfilled), it would be one heck of a process for the party making the request.

    I suppose if there was enough money at stake, it might be worth it. But given the nature of South Africa's internet setup, one of those steps would likely involve obtaining the most tediously bulky report from either Telkom or Internet Solutions. Which presents two rather interesting potential challenges - soliciting the report from Telkom, and then finding that needle in a haystack.

    The law doesn't require that the trace needs to be easy... And I strongly suspect it won't be unless it comes out of an online private network domain (as in the fascinating Wikipedia edits by Stats SA).

    As for how much resistance might be put up along the way - well that is dealt with in our privacy statement. I expect Hello Peter has also done their homework on this.

    All this to cross before we get to freedom of speech and citizen journalism type defences, trying to assign a value to the slander, and the distinct possibility that even if the case was won, the guilty person has not got the means to financially satisfy the award anyway.

    It all sounds awfully expensive and tedious.

    But of course I might be wrong...

  6. #16
    Email problem Chris B's Avatar
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    "...You may be Wrong, You may be Right..."

    I must first say that I have never used or heard of hellopeter.com untill I've read this thread.
    On the outsiders point of view I can say the following:
    If I had to be seen under the same light you will probably find that to an extend my business and infact most businesses work on the same principle.
    We see a demand for a service or product, we find a way to force customers to use it which in itself makes it viable for other companies to use us...
    Peter went and did the same thing as an estate agent would do, being a middle man in a pressing situiation as having to get two parties to agree on something and walk away happy.
    Yes, there will be people who has not found satisfaction in his creation but show me the business that hasn't got unhappy clients. And yes there will always be ways to improve on what he/we do in our ethics, sales technics etc. to improve the perception from the public. I know sales reps who projects far worse promises just to get a sale and some of you know that their in you companies too, but we use them because they get the sales...

    To tell you the truth, I think that everyone that doesn't agree with the idea might just be a little bit jelous that they din't think of it first...
    Carpe diem, all the way!

  7. #17
    Platinum Member Chatmaster's Avatar
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    Interesting reply Chris B,

    I listened to Peter's response on 702 the other day. It all made sense to me. He is in it to make money and he honestly feel he is delivering an honest service that are worth the fees he charges as he is fulfilling a pr function for the company. There is clearly allot of people supporting his website. Both on the side of the consumer and from business. This also makes sense depending on how you look at it.

    Companies should be excited as the site allow them to easily communicate with their consumers and resolve possible problems. This should benefit both small and large pr departments and especially companies without any pr departments. Hellopeter simply SMS or email them the moment there is a complaint about them.
    Further Peter made it clear that he calculates the costs based on the amount of complaints they get. The more complaints there is a for a company, the more they will pay. He said the allegations that hellopeter request documentation with the turnover of the business was completely false and that the costs are purely calculated based on the number of complaints they get.

    No here is the catch!

    If my PR department handles every case they have in public it will be a disaster! I might be able to get some positive marketing out of some complaints. But most people will look at it in the long run and remember all the complaints, apposed to me having a pr department that only response to public complaints and do the washing in public when it is absolutely required. The rest of the complaints are resolved in private. It is also important to note that many complaints can be the fault of the complainant and very often the company the complaint is against did nothing wrong.

    Now what role does hellopeter play? All complaints are public, whether or not you as a business have paid the fee or not. You can only respond if you pay the fee which goes to Peter based on his reasoning that he assists you with a pr function at a fraction of the cost. Is this true however?
    IMO the answer is no. PR strategies whereby washing is done in public is highly risky. Companies will avoid it all costs as it can be a very complicated thing to handle. You will note that Peter has a very small (but profitable) representation of companies on his site. This makes sense as fortunately only the 400 on his site either felt the heat he generated against them or perhaps they feel they can do with his service, or maybe a few that feels that this is a very successful way of handling PR.

    My problem is this. What is the real issue here?

    I sold biltong to Billy from my butchery. A week down the line Billy decides to make a post on Hellopeter because he put the biltong in his fridge and it was filled with maggots this morning. Anny reads it there and realize it is the butchery in her suburb we she buys from. Now the story runs! I find out about the issue from my daughter because someone called her a magget farmer at school. Finally I realize that Billy has reported me on Hellopeter. My butchery is very small and infact I have allot of debt just to get it up and running a few weeks ago. Now Peter wants to charge me R500 to respond and say, guys! This is nonsense, I will give you a new piece of biltong.

    The point here is that the concept is flawed, the problem is that peter is getting support from people on both business and consumer and I do not think Peter has the right to charge business any fees as that is not fair to expect it from them.
    Last edited by Chatmaster; 04-Sep-07 at 01:35 PM.
    Roelof Vermeulen (Entrepreneurship in large organizations)
    Roelof Vermeulen| Rock flaps south africa

  8. #18
    just me duncan drennan's Avatar
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    Seems like there is a growing tide of resentment towards HelloPeter,

    Some call him an extortionist, others a champion of customer service. An anti-Hellopeter website was even started.

    HelloPeter – and its owner Peter Cheales – is in the firing line from a group of consumers and some companies who feel that the website is an extortion scheme which forces companies to pay to respond to consumers.

    Criticism has also been leveled at the information supplied by the website about its traffic and statistics. An anti-HelloPeter website, hosted at http://hellopeter.wetpaint.com/?t=anon, was started highlighting many of the criticisms aimed at the website in the past.

    Full story on MyBroadBand
    If you read the whole article there are a number of interesting comments. This stuck out to me,

    Consumers have also accused the site for deleting comments, something which can get a disgruntled customer hot under the collar. In one such case – aimed at HelloPeter itself – Cheales simply replied “Sunday afternoon and I really can’t be bothered to respond to childish drivel – Peter”, something which drew sharp criticism from some observers.
    Now, whatever the particular case was is not so important, but the way things are handled is. I've seen this type of behaviour elsewhere before and it breaks down community in the long run - and the basis of this type of site is a strong community. Lose that, and there is no reason for customers to use it, or companies to respond.

    Interesting times ahead.
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  9. #19
    Platinum Member Chatmaster's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by dsd View Post
    Consumers have also accused the site for deleting comments, something which can get a disgruntled customer hot under the collar. In one such case – aimed at HelloPeter itself – Cheales simply replied “Sunday afternoon and I really can’t be bothered to respond to childish drivel – Peter”, something which drew sharp criticism from some observers.
    Well Peter did admit to this in his radio interview with 702. His explanation was that he deleted repeated posts to prevent duplication.

    Ironically the so called "PR genius" has his own PR problem to deal with. I am also afraid that this time he might not be able to sort it out, the Internet doesn't take kindly on people that underestimates its power.
    Roelof Vermeulen (Entrepreneurship in large organizations)
    Roelof Vermeulen| Rock flaps south africa

  10. #20
    Platinum Member Chatmaster's Avatar
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    I also would like to comment on the Traffic stats that Peter claims he is getting. Many people has had things to say about it.



    10mil Hits?
    This is absolutely possible if you look at the definition of a hit. I mean if he has a mountain of images, .js files etc that loads with every page, he can easily get that amount of hits, regardless of the amount of unique visitors he gets.

    From my experience, I would estimate Hellopeter's traffic at no more than 15,000 unique visitors a day. That is about 10,000 over what I really believe it is, just because Google has over 70,000 pages indexed, and that means that they can probably rank for any kind of keyword and get all kinds of untargeted traffic. (The SEO on this site is really poorly done)

    For example if you take his customer with the largest amount of complaints and do searches on it, SA Only results on Google, you will not find his site under the top 10. The keyword is "Telkom"

    2,000 comments each day?

    His own website reveals the truth here.

    Go to VIEW COMMENTS
    Ensure that you select "all" Countries and "2 days ago", then click search.
    Result is 510 results (FOR 2 DAYS). My maths says that this is a bit short of 2,000 per day.
    Ensure that you select "all" Countries and "10 days ago", then click search.
    Result is 1853 results (FOR 10 DAYS). My maths says that this is a bit short of 2,000 per day.
    Over 90 days there has been 17311 complaints added. The average per day is then 192 per day!

    Now something that completely bugs me about Peter.
    If you look at the play of words on his site! Is this guy serious about everything he says? I mean seriously! If there is one thing I HATE, it is if someone treats me as a fool. He is doing exactly that. It started for the first time in 2001, In one of these speaker books. But let me take this example now!

    At the bottom of his home page.
    "The world's most viewed comments" "The world's most"
    Please define this for me Peter! You have NOTHING, nadda, none, no idea what this means! You do not even have one comment from any other country available through your search! Only South Africa! His world is really tiny

    Sorry guys I am loosing it here! Time to go for a swim.
    Roelof Vermeulen (Entrepreneurship in large organizations)
    Roelof Vermeulen| Rock flaps south africa

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