Beware: Digital Direct Network

While I don’t usually like to post negative things on my site, I find myself in a situation where I feel compelled to warn others who may be sucked into an “opportunity” in mobile marketing that is most likely a huge scam. Let me give you a bit of background.

In June of this year I was approached by two colleagues about a mobile marketing business called Wicoup – an MLM business opportunity centered around text messaging. Although I was apprehensive about it at first, over time through numerous phone calls and online meetings I became convinced that it might have potential as a good mobile marketing business. I was especially excited when in August I was asked to fly out to San Diego to meet with the then Executive Vice President of the company, John Rustin.

The meeting was about me developing a training program for them and I was told up front that my airfare and travel expenses would be paid by the company. By the way, Wicoup (now known as Digital Direct Network) is owned by Madison Avenue Media (a publicly traded company under stock symbol OTCBB:KHZM).

Without going into way more detail than is really necessary, what happened is that I flew out to San Diego and met with John Rustin. The following week on 8/11/10 John Rustin and I had a phone call with Stephen Molinari, the CEO of Madison Avenue Media, to discuss a proposal from me about the training.

In that phone call Mr. Molinari said a few things that made me very concerned that his company might be planning to do mobile spam. (I had had misgivings like this at several other points in our dealings but had been reassured along the way by my well meaning colleague who first introduced me to this company that everything was above board.)

Here is an email that I sent Stephan Molinari and John Rustin to clarify the situation:

Steve and John:

Despite my excitement after our phone call today about the huge opportunity in Wicoup, there was something said in our call that I keep thinking about. Frankly, it is weighing on my mind heavily. I want to make sure that I didn’t misunderstand you. You said something about having access to every cell phone number in North America on a list and that once it was scrubbed against the Do Not Call list that you would be able to use that to build your opt-in database and gather more demographic information on the owners of the numbers.

Do you intend to send unsolicited text messages to this list of cell phones? Or were you saying something else? I am hoping you meant that this list could be compared to your opt-in database and somehow compile a more robust marketing database. I need to know if unsolicited mobile contact is part of your business model.

Additionally, I would like to know what your specific plans are for the 60 million opt-in numbers in relation to the business owners who would be signing up for Wicoup services. Would they be able to send messages to this database? If so, under what conditions?

Lastly, when a consumer texts in to receive a mobile coupon from Wicoup how is it that they will be notified that they are being added to a database for future communications? Will each business be able to build a database of their customers that only they can send messages to?

I know this is a lot of questions, but these are VERY important to me to be answered clearly, succinctly and directly. I have to say up front that I want absolutely no part of mobile spam and I’m hoping you don’t either since you mentioned a law firm specializing in mobile and having a compliance officer. Here’s the bottom line – I am hearing mixed messages about your company’s stance on this and it is troubling me.

What I see is that Wicoup has the potential to be the biggest and best mobile marketing business opportunity around the world. I would love to be a part of it and help train people to sell smart, ethical mobile marketing tools to businesses. Please tell me that is what you want to do too.

Kim Dushinski

I have never received a response.

Likewise, I have not been reimbursed for my airfare. Despite numerous attempts on my part to collect it. It seems very odd that a publicly traded company would refuse to pay a $482 airfare reimbursement request. Or respond at all to a professional in the industry who had grave concerns about the way business would be handled. Especially when the company had just asked me to fly out to meet with them. This was not unsolicited on my part. There is something not quite right about this whole situation.

My recommendation about Direct Digital Network and Madison Avenue Media is to listen to your gut. I wish I had. Would have saved myself a lot of time, energy and at least $482.

4 Comments

  1. Thanks for bringing this to light and am sure there are many such companies with the “grab my share” mentality.

    I saw their website and i truly believe that this is mobile spamming. How else are they able to acquire 100m cell phone numbers and making it available for their agents if it isn’t for spamming intentions.

    My problem with these mobile marketing companies with an MLM business model is that they attract hustlers that have no intention of spending the effort and time in learning their craft. How do you diligently serve your customers when you are recruiting driven instead of service driven.

    Mobile Marketing is more than text messaging. SMS messaging is one facet of the various mobile marketing paths. There is Mobile banner advertising, mobile search marketing,mobile web, mobile social marketing,mobile video,mobile applications, QR code, Mobile commerce etc.

    A truly holistic 360°mobile campaign strategy requires most of these approaches, and i’m certain most these so called recruits have no idea of the mechanics of these other paths. All they do is run around harassing business owners selling text marketing they know nothing about.

    Granted SMS is the most widely preferred method of mobile marketing because of its ubiquity and mass user adoption, the other mediums are quickly gaining steam as smartphone penetration rate increases and faster broadband access becomes more available. I don’t think these businesses are positioned to help millions of business that need this dynamic marketing channel.

    My fear is that these “mobile marketing companies” behaviour will certainly invite the attention and regulation of the FCC in respect to mobile spamming. I’m grateful that you’ve used your prominence in the mobile community in bringing attention to this kind of practice and potential abuse of this most personal communication channel.

  2. Former employee who can tell you from experience that they don’t pay their employees. Quit after missing several pay checks (still never got them). Molinari constantly “promised” that pay was coming “next week.” That was almost a year ago, so the fact that they are still operating in November is astonishing (and disgusting).

  3. It is my belief after dealing with Molinari that he has a history of scamming. I personally know someone who lost all of their money after becoming involved in an investment that he was promoting. His MO at that time was the same as is described by “Former Employee”. First he made constant promises the the money was coming. Later he became incommunicado.

  4. This company has no relation to the LA based Digital Direct Networks LLC, which is a linear channel developer for IPTV/VOD platforms. I have been working with the LA based Digital Direct Networks LLC for four years and have found this article and was also a little confused by similar name. It is confusing as the above company Madison Avenue Media had a division called Digital Direct Network which was doing cell phone projects and appears to have had questionable ethics. Digital Direct Networks LLC is a good bunch of guys with exceptional ethical and fair contracts and great code of conduct. I felt it necessary to clear the air for others who may stumble upon this article.
    Regards
    Eric D.
    Planet X TV

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