Forum Moderators: phranque
I need some help asap, I am sure this is somewhat a common problem, I was doing a website of my own and handing sales over to a company I worked for (sort of like a sales affiliate) when the company saw that I was getting good leads they approached me.
At this point the site was under my name and i created it, they wanted me to create a new site with the company name for the URL and then I created all the logo stuff, now of course the logo stuff can be changed but the URL that is marketed and doing well cannot...
I took this up on the basis that I do, of which is that I would design and build the website, and market the website in return for a commision on sales, pretty standard affilate sales internet marketing exept with a small company who did not even know this stuff existed....
So I bought the web hosting, registered the domain in my name, with the company name as the URL, and did all the work on my own and own time at home with no pay involved at all,
They were to handle the phones and orders and pay a commision per sale on a dedicated phone line for my sales calls...
I got good hits and doubled the hits of the old site which I was able to land accounts on....after 9 months went by and I kept hearing no calls are coming in and so forth I felt perhaps something was not right, I should have got calls and some jobs had to be landed in this time perioid with the hits the site was getting and the hits were well targeted....
I went and switched the phone number on the site to my 800 number only to realize I was getting like 3 calls per day from SOLID leads which should have been landed...
I played hardball and left the phone number up, they realized this and ordered I shut the site down, I did not...they sort of went away after I explained that I did all this work, was lied to and never paid for any jobs they landed and so on...
Things went away a bit, never talked to them again and just left the site sitting there, thought about throwing ad sence on it or something to recoup some of the time and work I did...
now the company has contacted me wanting to reach an agreement on the domain name...asking if "I own it" which I do, it is registered in my name.
They are looking to reach an agreement on I suppose purchasing the site and domain from me...
What do I do? can I have legitimate ownership of this domain name and URL? I would rather just keep the site myself and throw adsence and advertisments on it , as I am angry that they lied and took advantage of me...
There was no written contract of any kind...
I registered anbd bought the domain name, but the name of the domain is the name of there company...
Please help!
TIA
If you can get out of this for a fair price, then do so.
Kaled.
BUT.,..is there anyway to hold onto this site for myself? I would rather do that....
Clearly, they were in the wrong. If you act reasonably at this stage, it would strengthen your hand if a legal battle were to ensue but the only winners would be the lawyers so avoid that if possible.
As I said, if you can get out for a fair price, do so, you won't regret it. If they won't pay what you think is fair, that's a problem, but you haven't reached that point yet.
When opening negotiations, think carefully whether to start with the guy that (apparently) stiffed you or his boss if he has one. Very different tactics might be required, for instance, subordinates don't like to be made to look bad, but that sort of pressure won't work with the boss. Also, telephone and/or face to face negotiation is much better than email or post.
Kaled.
I sell the site for a couple grand to them they will recieve calls targeted for them and land accounts for the rest of their lives...accounts that could be million dollar life changing accounts...
After I was screwed I cannot have then reap the benefits of my work...
I would rather take the calls and land the accounts and go off on my own on the work i did,
I think if I trademark the name and register the busniss name in my state i could legally have all rights to run business under the domain name....
the fact is, selling it to them gets me a couple thousand bucks, but they get all the calls from my work for a long time, perhaps landing a huge account for it, which I should get 10% from lifetime of the account...
Try ten thousand (or more) and see how they respond.
Always remember to keep personal feelings out of it. Anger and resentment can
cloud your judgment.
Be like the Mafia " its not personal, its business " Good luck! KF
There was no written contract of any kind
Were there e-mails sent and received while rhe business was being planed and set up. The e-mails might make it clear that the other Company were in agreement with the whole process.
