So… Jake quit.

Am I surprised? Not really.

Am I glad? Absolutely. Dealing with the man was exhausting. I’m pretty sure that misogyny is his middle name. He clearly did not appreciate having to work with a female. (I was going to add more to this sentence, but the truth is, he just seemed like he didn’t like me because I was female. He also took the liberty of blaming his blunders on his assistant, exclaiming that she was female. I reckon that most of his interactions with females are the same)

I’m exhausted.

Last week he said in an email that I was ‘probably PMSing’ and that’s why I was so particularly hard on him in the meeting we had with my company’s CEO. Firstly, those were all legitimate questions that I asked. Secondly, what a fucking idiot.

Honestly, they had to talk me down last Thursday when I saw that email. Part of me wanted to get on a plane and go visit him just so that I could feel the joy of punching him in the face.

We all thought he was going to quit. We were waiting for him to quit. Yesterday when he “took a stand” and defended his character against my “perilous attacks”, the three of us in the meeting simultaneously thought “what took you so long?”.

What caused him to quit was a surprise to me. Well actually, I guess I’m not really surprised at what caused him to quit when I think back on it. In the moment it seemed like an easy-exit and oooooh boy did he throw a temper tantrum. Jake quit because I asked that he sign a confidential disclosure agreement. I honestly didn’t think it was a lot to ask. He wanted me to provide all of the analytics for my website, my budgets, sales aggregates and administrative views of all of our digital platforms, access to certain clients and a full list of our direct, closest competitors. I wanted him to sign an agreement that said he wasn’t going to take all of the data we provided him to our direct competitor to say ‘Hey, pay me double and I’ll give you their data’.

Jake took my asking him to sign a confidential disclosure agreement as an attack on his character and his business.

Surely I can’t be the first person in his 12 years of business who’s asked for some sort of an agreement to ensure our data and client information is protected?

He was MAAAAAAAAAAD.

I have a two year old nephew and my nephew’s tantrums are easier to deal with than Jake was in that meeting yesterday.

He stomped his foot (actually, he stood up on camera to stomp his foot), he said ‘how dare you’ with great passions and even exclaimed that his twelve years in business, he’s never been so disrespected by a client before me. Which… holla! If asking someone for a totally legitimate legal agreement that he’ll protect confidential information is disrespectful, I’ll take that trophy.

Due diligence is a lot more important to me than hurting his tiny ego.

I don’t know him. And from the interactions we’ve had, I’m not that impressed with his character. How on earth am I supposed to trust that my company’s private data will be protected in his care?

After his tantrum Jake said that he would speak with us in a few hours and promptly ended the call.

About a half hour later he had his assistant send us an email letting us know that he cannot work in partnership with a company that would so boldly call his character and his business into question and for that reason he is terminating our partnership.

Good fucking riddance.

Bye Felicia.

Our CEO wrote him back saying that he’s expecting a full refund by Friday of this week and that if we don’t have it by that time then our lawyers will be in contact.

I officially have ‘Veto Power’ from here forward. I no longer have to deal with Jake, and I’ve been given the green light to leave reviews about his sexist emails and remarks (administrative duties, babysitter and PMSing) online.

To those who were asking why I don’t name/shame him in the stories I share on this blog, I can’t. Well, I could, but I won’t. I can only speak to his shiteous personality, bad attitude and absolutely uncalled-for comments about me because I am female. Sure, I think his business is a scam, but I can’t prove that. If I cannot prove that, I cannot speak to that. The internet is forever and it wouldn’t be right for me to leverage speculation on the internet that could negatively effect his business and the jobs of those who work for him, no matter how much I dislike the man.

I think his business is a scam, yes. I don’t know his business is a scam, though. So he’s just Jake. No last name, no business name. I’ll be leaving appropriate reviews in adequate places that explain his distaste for the female gender. People deserve to know that much.

Anyways, Jake is gone and I am so dang happy about that.

Meeting with Jake in one hour

He sent my boss a really salty email about the fact that he should be able to do his work ‘without a babysitter’ (direct quote, referring to me as a babysitter), but that if we don’t trust him, he will allow us to see the process. It will inevitably take him longer, though. As a result, he will charge us more.

He then said ‘Can’t wait to meet Katie. If she’s anything like Vee, I’m going to be earning a lot more, you know what I’m sayin?’ (Katie is a coworker that I work with a lot)

I’m trying to figure out why this moron is so dense that he just thinks the entire male gender is a part of his ‘broo-ha-ha’ boys club, or if he shoots emails like these into the dark as a test, hoping he’ll get the response he so desires.

If I were a betting woman, I would suggest the majority of his clients are men.

Wish me luck.

Jake just won’t quit.

I’m forty-three minutes into the day and I’m ready give up on the day.

This petulant asshole is trying to get fired. I swear.

If this is how he operates his business, I am unsure as to why anyone would do business with him. Maybe that’s it, though. Maybe no one does business with him and this entire facade is… a scam… like I predicted from day one.

Stories to come.

Additional question that I haven’t previously asked but am wondering more with each passing day: If this man runs a successful marketing company that has raised more than a billion dollars in capital and worked with companies like Nike and Samsung, why is he handling my company’s account? Why am I dealing with the head of the company? One would think (well, I would think) that if he’s so great he’s worked with two of the most recognizable brands on earth and raised more than a billion dollars in capital, that he’d have people who work under him who handle smaller accounts. But no, the head of the company handles all accounts? Every last one of them? Either he’s passing off accounts to people without acknowledging that, or, he doesn’t have as many accounts as he’s trying to portray that he has.

Jake is chachi.

Jake is so chachi. (A fool)

After he annoyed our CEO yesterday, I asked for us to have a call. Our CEO, wanting to watch me put him in his place, scheduled the meeting, waiting for Jake to accept, and then invited me after he’d accepted. Some might say manipulative, but, I say he deserved it after his comments yesterday saying that he wasn’t going to need my assistance unless he had administrative issues.

First thing Jake said when I showed up in the video chat? “Ohhhhhh, who’s this?”

“This is Vee. She has some questions for you that I too, would like to know the answers to,” our CEO said.

“Ohhhhh, terrific.” He said, sarcastically. “Hit me with your worst!” He exclaimed.

I gave a pleasant greeting, thanked him for his time with myself and our CEO and his response was ‘That’s sweet. What do you need from me?’

Well Jake. I need a lot. HAHAHA!

He definitely was not prepared to cross paths with me. He got very defensive. VERY DEFENSIVE. He quickly turned hostile, and I don’t think he could’ve hung up the call more quickly than he did when he determined the meeting was over because he’d had enough.

Me: “So Jake, I’ve read you’re a marketing genius, that you actually graduated with honours from Stanford. You also run a business that’s raised more than 1 billion dollars in capital during its lifetime. That’s really impressive.”

Jake interrupts me: “Thank you, thank you. I do what I can.” He was acting smug at this point.

Me: “Why does your google business page, for a business that’s more than a decade old and has raised more than a billion dollars in capital, provide the address for a Dollarama?”

Jake begins tripping over his words, dumbounded at the question he just heard.

Jake: “Well, that might have been an oversight on our former assistant. I didn’t keep track of the data that she logged.”

Me: “But Jake, you’re the marketing genius, you’re the face of the company. You didn’t once think to google your own company? Surely you’re not running your billion dollar business out of the back of a dollar store?”

Jake: “Well, well, umm… well…”

Me: “That’s okay, I’ve clearly caught you off guard. I’ve got a few more questions, we can move onto those, if that’s alright?

Jake: “Oh, yeah… yes, hit me with them!”

I take note at how quickly he’s wanting to move on after metaphorically falling flat on his face from my first question.

Me: “Your website proclaims that you provide SEO and business integration services for companies that allows them broader reach, better digital footprints and repeat visitors to their websites and social media platforms. I was very interested with the piece about working with Nike and Samsung. Those are some impressive clients.”

Jake: “Yes, we’re very proud of how we help our clients and the clients we’ve been able to bring into the fold over the years.”

Me: “I’m just curious what information you can provide to companies like Nike and Samsung, some of the most recognizable brands on earth, when your very own marketing company hasn’t done proper enough SEO for it’s own digital footprint to appear on any of the first five pages of any search engines.”

Jake, clearly getting pissed off at me at this point, but trying to stay professional: “I’m sorry?”

Me: “When I google your company, all I see is a google business page that directs me to a Dollarama. There isn’t a link to your actual business website anywhere on the first five pages of google.”

Jake: “We have a very common business name.”

Me: “Surely a marketing genius as good as yourself, someone who graduated with honours from Stanford, could be able to figure a way around that? After all, you are charging us $7,500 to do SEO for our business. How do I know I’m going to get quality results from a man who won’t even do SEO for his own business?”

Jake: “We’re speaking semantics here. Whether or not I do SEO for my own company matters not to how I can help your company.”

Me: “Okay, well are you aware that each of your four defunct company Instagram pages that haven’t been updated in several years rank higher for search engines then your actual company website?”

Jake: “We don’t have four Instagram pages!”

Me: “Actually, you do. You also have a Facebook page that hasn’t been updated since 2014, that provides a different business address from your google business page, and a Twitter account that I’m pretty certain your coworker used as a platform to profess is his love, and subsequent hatred, for his former fiancee during their breakup.”

Jake, stumbling over his tongue with a depressing frown on his face: “I can’t tell you what my coworkers would’ve done with respect to social media platforms for the company.”

Me: “But you’re in charge of marketing. Surely you understand the importance of a clean, and thoroughly vetted, digital footprint? Especially in a sales/service industry.”

Jake to our CEO: “I’ve got a lot of things to do today. Are we done yet?”

Me: “You know Jake, I was just hoping we could meet on a level playing ground. I want to ensure our company is getting the best bang for our buck. Surely you can understand that with our initial investment, and with the money we’re due to pay you yet, that we were hoping to get our concerns addressed so each party can work cohesively together.”

Jake (making a fist as though he’s frustrated but trying to stay calm): “What do you want?”

Me: “I was curious… “

Jake: “What? What are you curious about?”

Me: “You and each of your colleagues have exactly the same amount of contacts on LinkedIn. It’s a rather obscure number as well.”

Jake: “So?”

Me: “Did you purchase those connections?”

Jake: “Are you kidding me?”

Me: “Also, I’m curious, how many employees does your company have? LinkedIn says 47-200, but your website says four. You’ve eluded to only a handful and a quick google search (seeing everything that comes up prior to your business website on the search engine) brought me to a listing for your company on the Business Bureau that says you have 9. So… how many people are working there?”

Jake: “Is that relevant to anything, or are you just trying to be difficult?”

Me: “Just call me curious.”

Jake to our CEO: “Well [CEO’s name], the third degree this morning has been great, but I actually have to head off for another meeting in about ten minutes here that I need to prepare for. I’ll be in touch in a few days.”

Jake immediately hangs up from the call before I or the CEO could say anything more.

The CEO immediately started laughing now that we were the only two left on the call. I asked him what he thought was so funny. He laughed and said “Dang, could you imagine what would happen if you ever decided to go to Law school? I felt like I was watching a deposition… and he crumbled, very quickly.”

We agreed to wait to hear from Jake to see what he had to say. We hung up the call and I went on with my day.

Jake, about a half hour ago, had his assistant email our CEO asking that work moving forward be run through him and that I not be included because he feels I would make the project more difficult than it has to be.

Our CEO wrote his assistant back, CC’ing Jake and myself, saying that all work and communication can run through me, or Jake can give back the $7,500 we paid him.

Sir, you picked the wrong woman to underestimate

A few weeks back I shared a story about how my company’s CEO signed us up to work with a Consulting company that, from the outside, seemed like a scam.

After I wrote that I addressed my concerns with the CEO and he assured me that this was a chance he was willing to take and if we got scammed, or fell flat on our faces, thanks to the move, he’d give me veto power from here forward. So I said I’d be a willing participant.

Our CEO emailed Jake at said company and told Jake that I would be the primary point of contact for our company and to run all communications and work through. He also asked that we start on January 11.

It’s January 11th.

You know who I never heard from on the first 10 days of January? Jake.

I thought ‘Wow, okay. Jake must be one of those ‘Walk into work at 8:00 am when he starts at 8:00 am’ kinds of guys.

Nevertheless, I didn’t say a thing. I patiently waited.

This morning, our CEO CC’ed me on an email to Jake and says ‘As noted in the emails I sent on December 23rd and January 5th, all communication and work needs to go through Vee’.

Jake had emailed the CEO this morning asking for information to get started with the project, ignoring the two emails in which our CEO said to go through Vee.

The CEO then wrote him back, CC’ing me, saying ‘Please send all communication and work through Vee’. If there’s one person at my work you don’t want to piss off, it’s the CEO. I could tell from the tone of the email that he was annoyed.

Jake is… either an idiot, or a cocky asshole… or possibly a combination of both? Nevertheless, Jake ‘replied all’ to the email. In the email he wrote back that was sent to myself and our CEO, he said:

“I only really need help from you at the moment. I’d also prefer to keep conversations between us guys, to keep it easier. If I run into administrative issues, then I can get Vee involved.”

US GUYS? Who writes that in a business environment? It sounds so sexist. Does he think he’s being funny? Is he really dumb enough to not understand how it sounds?

ADMINISTRATIVE ISSUES? This is entirely sexist from my perspective. Noting the inclusion of the female involved would only occur if there are administrative issues. What does he think I do? Store passwords for the Social Media platforms to let our CEO run them?

It’s day one of our agreement and Jake, you’re already annoying me. You’ve already annoyed our CEO. Oh, I cannot wait to see what kind of a hot mess this develops into. Jake thinks I’m the designated coffee deliverer for this company, apparently.

My most popular post of 2020

From when it all began. When I rewrote history and carved a new path. It is without a doubt the best thing that happened to me in 2020. And, when I look back on this year, I will make a conscious effort to remember the feelings I felt when I wrote this post.

The tectonic plates have shifted and I got a job. A really good job. Dare I say… a great job!
I just finished my first day of work. I am working remotely until COVID calms down.
I am the Marketing/Digital Marketing Coordinator for a tech company. I’m going to start their blog, ramp up their social media profiles and take control of branding and graphic design.
From “I got a job!” on May 25, 2020

I don’t have a good feeling about this

The CEO, without consulting me, signed our company up for a contract with a B2B Agency in the United States. I learned of it in the December company staff meeting. Apparently I am set to start working with them in January and he’s arranged everything.

The CEO is also on holiday until January 2nd.

I will preface this story by saying that I don’t have a lot of faith in B2B Agencies. While I am sure there are a few good ones scattered here and there, the majority of the industry is… kind of a giant money grab. There, you’ve heard my bias. Now, on with the story.

This morning he sent an email to the gentleman who will be an account manager for us at the B2B Agency. He cc’ed me on this email so I both know the account manager’s name, and the business name now.

Since the CEO is off for the next two weeks, I thought I’d do a little bit of research to find out what he’s signed me up for in January.

My first issue – when I google the company, they don’t come up on the first page of google. They don’t even come up on the second page of google. This is a company that charges tens of thousands of dollars to tell you how to revamp your digital footprint, and all that’s listed on the front page of google when you search them is a street view of their supposed office address and a link to their Instagram and Facebook pages. Considering they claim to have been in business since 2009, how have they never invested in SEO?

My second issue – the Company website of this B2B agency is a shell. What does that mean? There’s a whole lot of flashy pictures and important buzzwords, but there’s not much else there. At all. For a company that specializes in digital marketing, social media and using your online footprint to generate leads, they haven’t seemed to invest anything into their own footprint.

My third issue – there are three different physical addresses listed for this company. On their Google business page they are listed as having an address that is a Dollarama store. On their Facebook page they provide an address that is a house in a different city. The third address, found on their company website, lists them as being in a somewhat famous building in the heart of the city. The building, famous for it’s only having four floors amidst skyscrapers that have 50+ floors, has a listing of tenants online. This B2B Agency is not in the listing of tenants. Okay, so I told myself that they moved from the house to the Dollarama location to the office building and just never bothered to update their addresses online. Then I told myself they only moved to the office building recently, so that’s why the tenant list hasn’t been updated. In my investigation, I called the building’s lobby and said that I was headed down their to visit the B2B agency and that I wasn’t sure where there was parking and I was wondering if they would provide any insights. The building lobby said ‘Who are you coming to see?’ I repeated the name of the company and the person said ‘I think you might have the wrong address’.

Okay, so… if it’s a company operating out of a house, there’s nothing wrong with that. Why are they lying and pretending to be in an office downtown, though?

My next issue – their shell of a website claims they specialize in B2B Marketing and Lead Generation through enhancing a companies digital footprint for strategic placement in ideal markets. (Marketing speak for ‘WE DO SOCIAL MEDIA’) This multi-million dollar B2B agency has five different Instagram pages, none of which have been updated since 2019. Oh, did I mention the Facebook page of their’s that I found the house address on hasn’t been updated since 2018? They also haven’t updated their Twitter since 2015. Weirdly, these Twitter, Facebook and Instagram pages all manage to rank higher on Google than their company website. So, are they showing potential clients what to not do with their online footprint?

Their website claims that they have 200 employees, but their staff directory claims to have four.

Okay, so all of these coincidences have my spidey senses tingling that this is some sort of a sham, take your money and give you a crap already written report type of B2B agency. So, I kept digging.

The CEO, CFO, COO and CMM (the only four listed employees in the staff directory) all have private LinkedIn accounts. Okay, they want to keep their information private? I can understand that. Except, they literally sell a service that is… their expertise. So keeping yourself private on LinkedIn is… I don’t understand that motivation. Oddly, all four of them have have exactly 387 contacts on LinkedIn. No more, no less. 387 contacts.

Their website claims they have over 1,200 happy clients yet there is not one review of their company/services seemingly anywhere on the internet.

Their website claims they have worked with some big name brands like Nike and Samsung and one particular major market sports team in the United States. There’s nothing that says anything about the work they did, though. And when you google the two company names together – the B2B name and Nike, for example, NOTHING comes up. If Nike is your claim to fame for a client/agreement that you’ve had and done, how is there no trace of that business relationship anywhere on the internet accept for your partnership page?

My spidey senses are really tingling at this point in time.

I am not crazy, I promise. I just… one or two coincidences I would consider acceptable. Everything that I found today seems too much to be true. Could every last one of these oddities be a coincidence? And they all just happen to be true and look weird? Could I be overthinking this?

Our CEO is a really smart individual when it comes to a lot of things, but he’s openly admitted several times before that he knows next-to-nothing when it comes to marketing and promotion, and that’s one of the reasons he hired me. I fear he is walking us right into a… costly, poorly executed trap.

Overheard on Discord: Axel has a girlfriend

I was a little perplexed as to why so much of the Discord content for a few months was about Axel’s dating life and then it just stopped. Part of me was curious if someone had told him to cut-it-out and that the discord wasn’t the place to share these stupid stories. ( Read here or here or here if you’re curious)

It turns out we haven’t heard any dating stories in a while because Axel has a girlfriend and he’s been keeping her secret. We learned this morning when he shared what he’s grateful for in 2020 on the office discord. His Tinder hookup who gave him COVID, subsequently exposing over a dozen of our staff, is now his girlfriend.

Apparently if they can get through COVID together, they can get through anything together, according to Axel. I don’t know that that is entirely true, but I do wish them the best. A little love is a good thing in this world we presently live. It helps make the days a little bit easier and the small things just that much nicer.

“Blogmas” Day 2

If you’re wondering what happened to Blogmas Day 1, so am I. Yesterday got away from me.

If you’re wondering what Blogmas is, I completely understand. Blogmas is a trendy tag that bloggers use to compete with the algorithm each Christmas season. You’re supposed to write a post every day leading up to Christmas. I’m not really trying to compete with any algorithm, and I can’t promise that I’ll even keep up with it. But, it does seem like an easy title to give my posts for the month of December.

What’s been going on lately? My mom’s had some health issues as of late and it has caused me a lot of worry. She’s spent my whole life telling me I’m too stubborn for my own good, but the truth is, I learned it from her. She is a very stubborn woman. I am just hoping that she gets through this soon and gets back to feeling like herself again.

COVID is still bad. For some reason they seem to believe that it’s going to miraculously disappear right before Christmas. I think they’re acting a little naive and a lot ridiculous being ten months into this and knowing how the general public acts, and reacts, to the pandemic at this point. But hey, what do I know?

Each morning at the start of the work day my sales team has a meeting to touch base before we do anything for the day. Our American crew (I’ve mentioned them before on here) are fighting as of late.

Kendra, who thinks COVID is a hoax, plans to go to Hawaii this weekend. Apparently Hawaii is doing this thing now where they don’t require a quarantine period as long as you can show a negative COVID test 72 hours before your flight. Kendra, not being the sharpest tool in the shed, has decided that she needs a holiday, so she’s headed to Hawaii. She’s angry that she has to get a COVID test at all, but, since she believes that Hawaii and Los Angeles are in the same time zone, it’ll all be worth it so she can pop off to Hawaii on Friday and pop back on Sunday.

Jason is mad at Kendra for not taking COVID serious. Jason has not taken COVID seriously since the beginning. But, last week Jason’s fiancee came down with COVID. Now, now… he cares. The past few months he’s been to California for a beach trip, Oregon for a fishing trip, Florida for a just because trip, and has continuously been out and about refusing to wear a mask because… why follow rules? Well, his fiancee now has COVID and I guess that’s what it took to actually make him give a damn. Jason now owns all the masks, all the sanitizer, all the things. He’s been tearing into Kendra since she announced her Hawaii plans because how dare she be so vapid and self-centered as to not take this pandemic seriously.

Sometimes I feel like the people I work with are characters in a Soap show.

I really need to start going to bed earlier. I always have good intentions of going to bed at a decent hour but then something good comes on television and I wind up awake to midnight, or even 1:00 am. It’s not good. I’m not a morning person and I definitely am not making things easy for myself by staying awake until 1:00 am and then having to get up for work. In my ideal world I could work from 12:00 – 8:00 pm and never have to wake up early again.

Okay, it’s time to get back to the real-world.

Happy Tuesday (that feels like a Monday).

More changes?

When I put my mind to something, I will accomplish it. I really don’t care if there are odds stacked against me. I really don’t give a damn what anyone thinks in the matter. If I know that I can do something, that something is going to get done.

I’ve begun looking for a new job.

Why? My job is great. The company that I work for is really great. They’ve been a saving grace through this pandemic. Sure, there are a few idiots here and there, but for the most part, the work is really enjoyable. On Thursday, though, they let me know there won’t be any room for growth within the company… at all. Not now. Not ever.

This was disappointing to hear. When I accepted the position, I knew I was doing so in the middle of a pandemic. But, I was promised there were room for growth. I was promised there was room to move up, to eventually seek management. To expand on the position. To take it where I could take it. They essentially shut the door to any of that.

I appreciate their honesty. The could’ve hid their plans from me and lied about it. Long term though, this isn’t somewhere I’m going to stay. With no room for growth, this isn’t somewhere that I should stay. It’ll work for now. It’s been a real blessing to have a pay cheque given everything that’s going on in the world. But I have no sense of company loyalty.

I’m not quitting, at least not until I find a new job. I’m looking for a new job now, though. I’m testing the waters, I guess you could say. There are plenty of other places in this city that I could take my skills. I’m sure one of them could realize what I bring to the table and give me the room to grow.

I don’t know. Am I crazy? Am I stupid for wanting more? Should I just be appreciative that I have a job given the state of the world? Don’t get me wrong, I am appreciative that I have this job given everything that’s going on in the world. I just hate the idea of settling… especially since it’s not an assumption, I was given full notice there’s no room for growth.

There’s a company out there that needs me, that is willing to offer opportunity for growth. I just have to find them. For the time being, I’ll be good to the company that I’m with… you know, so they give me a good reference and all.