Picking a fight! (Part 1)

Posted on May 13, 2010
in Blog, Sean's Rants
by Sean

The conventional wisdom holds “don’t diss your competitors” . Negative speech about your competitors reflects poorly on your own product/ company/ service. That’s probably generally true. But I’m going to break that rule because there’s something out there that’s starting to make me angry.

Hey, The Ladders Resume Writing Service – listen up, I am throwing down!

In the past two weeks alone, we have received 7 (!) resumes from job seekers who first went through TheLadders and were unhappy with the service. We’ve received dozens more over time, but I just recently decided to track it. Each of those 7 folks paid a minimum of $750 for the service…

and got diddly squat back.

Now they’re turning to Freedom Resumes either to fix TheLadders’ mistakes, or to get something done at all, because their initial resume writer didn’t produce. Of course, we are grateful for the business. But I am still furious at the scam.

Let me break it down a bit more.

TheLadders has a quality, brand name. That’s something we’re still working on, but in the start-up phase, we certainly don’t have that kind of rep. TheLadders is, rightfully, trading on that brand name. So they can charge $750 a resume (an obscene price from my perspective…). But they have a serious obligation to maintain their reputation and DELIVER A QUALITY PRODUCT.

TheLadders is in the unique position of being able to take advantage of a great many people who will trust them for resume advice simply because of the size of the company and the strength of their reputation. When job seekers pay $750 to TheLadders, it’s not just because they expect an excellent product, but because they understand they are paying a premium for the brand. TheLadders holds their trust. Taking advantage of that trust by charging a wacky price, for a product that took their resume writers less than an hour to produce (and I think that’s being generous), is an astonishingly bad business practice, and unfair to people who are already stressed out and spread thin from being in a job search.

Here’s how Freedom Resumes works, as a comparison.

We typically charge $250 per resume. For that $250, we generally have a minimum of 3 conversations with our client. Those conversations last at least 15 minutes, and frequently exceed an hour. So let’s average it out to 30 minutes per call. In other words, at $250 we’re typically committing 1.5 hours just to speaking with our client. Then, a normal resume re-write (you have an existing resume but it needs editing), takes an average of 2.5 – 4 hours to complete. Let’s take the lower end of that. We’re now at automatically committing, at a minimum, 4 hours of time, per client. Now, let’s add in: the time of the 2^nd resume reviewer (every resume gets 2 pairs of eyes), + the follow up after we’ve sent the final draft + the 6 month commitment to free revisions, and you’re looking at an average of 5-6 hours spent on a resume. For $250. Add onto all this, that every resume we write is completely tailored to YOUR needs. No prefab, auto fill spots. No standard list of edits. No so-called ‘core-competencies’ sections. We build from scratch EVERY SINGLE TIME.

There’s a massive difference between a Freedom Resume’s product and whatever it is you’re getting from TheLadders.

I know it’s bad form to insult a competitor. But to me, it’s much worse form to take advantage of people.

I’m proud of the Freedom Resumes product. I think we deliver excellent resumes at a great value. And we’re upfront with our clients about what the costs are and where they go. I am personally invested in the success of the company and I will do my best to make sure every client is happy with what they get.

Can the TheLadders say the same thing?

Stay tuned for my next blog post about some other beef I’ve got (unless my wife convinces me not to).

Had a different experience with TheLadders? Am I off base?

Post comments below J

Sean

Tags: Resume Writing, scam, theladders, throw down