hiring a lawyer for online stuff

I am debating on hiring a lawyer to deal with an online marketing issue.

Can anyone point me in the right direction of what kind of lawyer would handle something like this?

Thanks!

Dear Brismom, I have a close friend here in LV who was a law professor for 24 years, is a practicing lawyer and also sits part time on the bench. What is the issue? These guys are usually very specialized. If it's a litigation, I can tell you that can be expensive. I'm having Sunday brunch after Mass on Sunday with him and I can certainly ask his advice. He does a lot of pro bono work as well and is one of the very few attorneys I've known who is an honest, stand up guy.

Thank you Franknvegas,

I will try to make this short but there is a lot to it.

So last september, 1 year ago now, I launched my first webstie. This company Future Ranking contacted my about seo marketing my website. They told me everything that I wanted to hear, that they wouuld get me on the first page of google, that everyone on that page is making money, that the only way to get there is to have a marketing company get you there, etc. Along with this they are supposed to have a linkbuilding plan yet no links were built to my site. They have never contacted me to set up a link page on my site. They gauranteed this would happen somewhere in 8 months or I would get my money back.

So at the time was not real educated on SEO as I am know. I bought into to say the less, and 6 months had passed and I could not even find my website anywhere online for any of my keywords. Also in the meantime, I launched a second website, that I marketed myself and it was on the first page of google in 2 months. It is still there and is there for many different keywords. This teaching me that I can somehow do the job better than a company I paid a fortune too.

So here comes the fun part. I contacted them about the issue and all that they could tell me was that they were working on it and that the software, highpowersites that I had my site hosted on was not set up for ecommerce therefore they could not do there job effectively. At this point they were not willing to refund my money, so we agreed to switch my site to another hosting company so that they could do there job. This cost me more money and more time to switch. So basically I have been with this company for about 1 year now and my second site that I set up and marketed myself is doing better than the site they are marketing and it has been longer.

My question to them is what exactly are you doing to market my site, because it is not working.

Also look at these links, this is what other people had to say about the company,read through this forum post, I have many of the same complaintshttp://www.onlinemerchantforum.com/f...ad.php?t=13350

here is another one: http://www.linkreferral.com/forumlis...topic_id=17954

Let me know if I have confused u, or if you need anymore info. I really appreciate your help, I just want to know if I can really have a case with this or not, I think that I do, but I really want to get my money back and just be done with them.

I wrote back a long post of what happened, what the issue is, but it did not post?

So look at this forum thread, this a person who has had similar problem with the same company that I am dealing with, many of there complaints are mine as well

http://www.onlinemerchantforum.com/f...ad.php?t=13350

This is the easiest way to give you an idea of the issue without writing out the whole post again.
Thanks so much for your help , I really appreciate it.

Dear Brismom, I saw the post and it looks like these people are incompetent to say the least, maybe fraudulent but I think there's a better alternative than the expense and aggravation of legal action. First, get out of this as quickly and painlessly as possible. If you paid them with a credit card, you can call your cc company and "charge back" claiming you did not receive the service promised and want a complete refund. They may try to dispute this but usually any outfit this disorganized won't even bother. You have a year from payment to implement this. Just call the 800 number at the bottom of your credit card. Also, very important, put everything in writing. If it's not documented it doesn't exist. And run, don't walk, away from this service. Pretty much all these companies that guarantee SEO are a scam. Let me know if these steps work for you. If not, a letter from an attorney on their letterhead works wonders. Also, I think there are some great members in this forum (especially Lynn herself) and I would research and check around before hooking up with any service providers. A lot of them are real flakes. Hope this helps, Frank.

Thank you so much Frank, I was not aware that you could do that on your credit card, they have something written in their contract about chargebacks though, should I just disregard this and go for it.

This is what it says,
All Credit Card Charges are Fraudulent, As part of this agreement, you agree not to institue and credit card chargeback against Future Ranking.

Are u sure that I wont get a case against me?

This is an agreement that I signed of course a contract.

It looks like I only have 1 week left if I do a chargeback, October 23rd will be 1 year from the credit card transaction.

If cc charges are fraudulent then I guess they're in big trouble if they want to get paid. You're not talking about ranking,you're talking about services that were not performed...period. They must have some really stupid attorney to put a clause in there like that (and there's plenty of them around). I would call my credit card company and charge back today on the basis of services that were not provided. You are protected by Federal law on this, in fact our buddies at the FTC. That's why that 800 number's on your card. Hope this helps.

Really, thanks for clarifying this!

I use a local lawyer. Find someone locally you can trust, and feel comfortable with, to look over this issue with you and advise you on what to do.

This is also great advice from Lynn. A local referral is always best if you can find a good one and, if it's a state matter, some statutes are different. However, consumers are protected on credit card purchases under Federal law which apply in all states and scamming money from people is just plain wrong no matter where it happens.

I get a newsletter form an attorney who specializes in internet matters. His web site is: www.MikeYoungLaw.com

My experience is that he answers his own mail. You can email him at: mike@mikeyounglaw.com

HTH,
Georgann