Mini-rant about work, vol. 6,934,807

[JonInMiddleGA]

Mama's don't let your babies grow up to get within 5000 miles of advertising.

I've spent the last month or so getting several FB pages up for a client, standard fare to promote some of their product lines. The time was mostly spent in getting the various product managers on board, getting information from them in order to be able to generate content consistently, etc. With the daily maintenance with the sites up & running it was poised to be the most lucrative thing I've worked on in a couple of years, finally some steady work with an actual check attached. And it was likely to expand even further since a company hired more than a year ago to work on two other sites as part of SEO had completely dropped the ball & basically asked for their stuff to be assigned to us (or anybody, as long as they didn't have to worry with it).

Got a phone call a few minutes ago, from our contact at the client.

Seems the newly hired layer of marketing execs (the 3rd or 4th tier of different marketing branches within the multi-location company) had hired a company to begin work on social media pages. Of course they neither bothered to tell anyone else in the company, nor did they even make a cursory check to see if any pages existed. Somewhat ironically they discovered the pages were up when I gave the product managers the go-ahead to mention the pages to co-workers, friends, vendors, etc, that's what tipped off the left-coast crowd that the east-coast crowd hadn't been sitting on their hands waiting breathless for someone to finally do something.

Me: "So I guess I should worry that all my efforts will be for naught?"
Client: "Nah, no point in worrying about it, it will be or it won't be but there's nothing either of us can do about it anyway"

I don't know whether to cry, lay down in traffic, or just go ahead & snap and start shooting assholes a clip at a time.

[ice4277]

Ugh. I feel your pain. I've spent the last month trying to explain the importance of search engine marketing to our clients located across the Pacific Rim without having much success.

[Logan]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I don't know whether to cry, lay down in traffic, or just go ahead & snap and start shooting assholes a clip at a time.

I feel like I can venture a guess.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Logan

I feel like I can venture a guess.

Well the most obvious choice of the three is also the most complicated.
I mean, there's travel issues as well as coming up with as much ammo as I'd need to even make a fair effort at it.

[DaddyTorgo]

That's ridiculous Jon.

Hate those companies where the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. Have you thought of seeing if there's any way that the stuff that you've done can be...integrated with the work that they've done, and maybe you both can get paid and everybody can win or something??

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Mama's don't let your babies grow up to get within 5000 miles of advertising.

It's not just in advertising where this happens.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

That's ridiculous Jon.

Hate those companies where the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. Have you thought of seeing if there's any way that the stuff that you've done can be...integrated with the work that they've done, and maybe you both can get paid and everybody can win or something??

Honestly DT, the money was in the back end admin on this, so while I've been paid for the upfront time, that pales in comparison to what it would have meant to us over time. Hell, it was just nice to know for a change that there was actually going to be a steady (if smallish) stream of revenue for the first time in more months than I care to think about.

And while it's not remotely as pressing a matter from a practical standpoint, there's also the frustration of doing all the planning & grunt work, finally getting most of the product managers on board to cooperate (w/out their input, there's no way to generate even once-a-week content, which is what the first group that bombed so badly discovered), and even finding out that one of the products actually has a "road show" schedule lined up starting fall and continuing into next year, meaning I was happy that I was going to have an abundance of content to work with to help build a following for one of the pages.

And now, barring something totally unexpected, we won't be doing any of it.
Truth is though, having the financial rug pulled out from under us yet again is the really big deal but the other stuff definitely adds to my own reaction to it.

Just soul-crushing shit frankly & I gotta vent a little somewhere.

[albionmoonlight]

That sucks. Sorry, man.

[DaddyTorgo]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Honestly DT, the money was in the back end admin on this, so while I've been paid for the upfront time, that pales in comparison to what it would have meant to us over time. Hell, it was just nice to know for a change that there was actually going to be a steady (if smallish) stream of revenue for the first time in more months than I care to think about.

And while it's not remotely as pressing a matter from a practical standpoint, there's also the frustration of doing all the planning & grunt work, finally getting most of the product managers on board to cooperate (w/out their input, there's no way to generate even once-a-week content, which is what the first group that bombed so badly discovered), and even finding out that one of the products actually has a "road show" schedule lined up starting fall and continuing into next year, meaning I was happy that I was going to have an abundance of content to work with to help build a following for one of the pages.

And now, barring something totally unexpected, we won't be doing any of it.
Truth is though, having the financial rug pulled out from under us yet again is the really big deal but the other stuff definitely adds to my own reaction to it.

Just soul-crushing shit frankly & I gotta vent a little somewhere.

Aaaah. Gotcha. Well at least you've been paid for the up-front time, even if that's not where the best revenue would be. Fucking stupidness.

[Kodos]

Isn't working for a living grand?

[johnnyshaka]

Jon, do you have any recourse in terms of a service contract already in place?

Here's another angle...I'm guessing these guys aren't as dumb as we think and they knew exactly what they were doing...hiring you to do the setup and assuming you'd give them a good rate to get your foot in the door. Once they got what they need at your "intro-get your foot in the door rate" they jumped ship and found another company eager to give them their intro rate to do the maintenance.

Welcome to Walmart/Costco modeled corporate America.

Regardless, sorry you got the shaft from these pricks, Jon...but just remember that karma's a bitch.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by johnnyshaka

Jon, do you have any recourse in terms of a service contract already in place?

Nah, everything is PO based, and the PO's are cut roughly month to month.

I'm guessing these guys aren't as dumb as we think and they knew exactly what they were doing

Nope, not a chance. Seriously.

Par for the course with them for the past several years under new mgmt is actually the exact opposite, when we're replaced on projects the newcomers typically make 3x to 5x what we were willing to do the same work (or even more work) for.

Lest you figure "Jon must really suck", this is what my quote from our guy at the client was about, the bit about nothing either of us can do about it anyway". On the client side it's a combination of 1 part clueless & 2 parts politics, about different people wanting to have "their guys" in place on something.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by Kodos

Isn't working for a living grand?

Yes, but working for a grand ain't living.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Yes, but working for a grand ain't living.

Oh my brother ... TESTIFY !

[flere-imsaho]

$1,000/hour isn't bad, per se

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

That's ridiculous Jon.

Hate those companies where the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

Which is, like, every company with more than one employee in my experience. Then again, even some of the single employee companies.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

Which is, like, every company with more than one employee in my experience. Then again, even some of the single employee companies.

Close enough to truth for me to endorse, that's for sure.

I've seen so much with this client in particular that part of me figures there's at least one book in it if you could get all the details.

Thing is, the book wouldn't sell since it's all pretty common stuff, albeit I do think their style of hiring layer after layer of people to do the same job but virtually never letting anyone officially on the payroll go unless they leave of their own accord is a bit more unusual.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Thing is, the book wouldn't sell since it's all pretty common stuff, albeit I do think their style of hiring layer after layer of people to do the same job but virtually never letting anyone officially on the payroll go unless they leave of their own accord is a bit more unusual.

Er, Scott Adams did make a career out of this sort of thing, in books....

[lynchjm24]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Mama's don't let your babies grow up to get within 5000 miles of advertising.

I'm really not trying to be sarcastic, but how does a smart guy like you end up mixed up in crap like this?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by lynchjm24

I'm really not trying to be sarcastic, but how does a smart guy like you end up mixed up in crap like this?

Married into it actually.

Cliff Notes sequence was:
Low paid radio guy dates, and eventually marries, VP of media for the largest health care ad agency in the Southeast. Principals of agency, a married couple themselves, puts that new spouse (me) on payroll in a job that he was genuinely qualified to do (agency launched a syndicated radio show, I knew that aspect better than anyone they had on staff). Bounced from assignment to assignment within the agency for several years, learned a lot, discovered baby was on the way & didn't want to have him deal with 90 minute commutes before daylight & no idea when parents were coming home. I was a stay-at-home dad for 6 months or so until we launched our own agency back in late 1998.

[lynchjm24]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Married into it actually.

Cliff Notes sequence was:
Low paid radio guy dates, and eventually marries, VP of media for the largest health care ad agency in the Southeast. Principals of agency, a married couple themselves, puts that new spouse (me) on payroll in a job that he was genuinely qualified to do (agency launched a syndicated radio show, I knew that aspect better than anyone they had on staff). Bounced from assignment to assignment within the agency for several years, learned a lot, discovered baby was on the way & didn't want to have him deal with 90 minute commutes before daylight & no idea when parents were coming home. I was a stay-at-home dad for 6 months or so until we launched our own agency back in late 1998.

I didn't have to read past radio. My degree is in radio and TV production. It took me 10 days at ESPN to realize I needed to get the hell out.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by lynchjm24

I didn't have to read past radio. My degree is in radio and TV production. It took me 10 days at ESPN to realize I needed to get the hell out.

LOL, it a heck of a job or even career, but a really shitty way to earn a (so-called) living for 99% of the people in it.