Salesmen

Salesmen are not my favorite men--They try to sell me things. I'd purchased economy hosting to get rid of the ad bar on JacobKking.com, but it hadn't immediately disappeared from the site, so I call GoDaddy.com customer service.

• AUTOMATED SYSTEM [AS] : Welcome to GoDaddy.com. Your call may be monitored for quality assurances. For web hosting support, press 1. For all other support, press 2. For sales, press 3. For--
• ME: [1]
• AS: For server support, press 1. For domain support, press 2. For scripting support, press 3. All other support, press 4.
• ME: [*] (I wanted to go back to the main menu;"star" is supposed to be "cancel" on automated phone systems)
• AS: For server support, press 1. For domain sup--
• ME: [*]
• AS: For server--
• ME: [*]
• AS: For--
• ME: [* * *]
• AS: Sorry, all service personnel are busy. Your call is important to us. Please stay on the line--
• ME: [hangup]

I try again.

• AS: Welcome to GoDaddy.com. Your call may be monitored for quality assurances. For web hosting support, press 1. For all other support, press 2. For sales, press 3. For--
• ME: [3]
• AS: If you know your customer number, please enter it now, followed by pound.
• ME: [I do that]
• AS: Sorry, all service personnel are busy. Your call is important to us. Please stay on the line. If you would like to hold without music, press pound now.
• ME: [how bad could it be?]
  
  
• [terrible salsa music blares in my ear]
  
  
• ME: [#]
• AS: Your call is important to us. Please hold and someone will be with you shortly.
  
  
• [salsa music continues]
  
  
• ME: [# #]
• AS: Your call is important to us. Please hold and someone will be with you shortly.
  
  
• [salsa music continues]
  

• ME: [I pull out the .45]
  
• Sales Rep "Jeremy": Thank you for calling GoDaddy.com. This is Jeremy. How are you doing today?
• ME: [I put the .45 away] ...I'm fine. How are you?
• JEREMY: I'm great. I'm doing great. Can I have your customer number?
• ME: [I say my number again]
• JEREMY: And for verification, can I have the last four digits of your PIN?
• ME: I have a PIN?
• JEREMY: Or the last four digits of your credit card on file.
• ME: (When did I put a credit card on file?) [I give the number]
• JEREMY: Thank you. What can I do for you today?
  
• ME: Yeah, I recently used my free economy hosting credit for my web site, and an ad bar showed up on my page.
• JEREMY: Yeah, that's why it's free, lol.
• ME: Yeah, I figured, (you ass). Anyway, I bought the economy hosting plan to get the ads off my site, and they haven't disappeared yet.
• JEREMY: Okay, would you like to sign up for that now, or... oh, it looks like you already did.
• ME: Right, (I just said that). Is there something else I have to do on the site to get the ads off, or...
• JEREMY: Well, sometimes it just goes through processing, so it'll take 24 or 48 hours to go into effect, so you might still see the ads, but it's in the system.
  

At this point I reload my website for the hell of it. What do you know? The ads have disappeared just now. I was about to tell Jem that is services were no longer required, but he went into sales mode, and I went along with it like an idiot.

• JEREMY: Now, I see that you're only signed up for a month. Do you want to extend that to a year? It'll save you five percent.
  
• ME: Yeah, I do. That option wasn't on the website.
  
• JEREMY: That's okay. We have the option here in the office.
• ME: Okay. (Now you'll get a sales commission just because your company's web site sucks? I want your job.)

I truly did want to sign up for a whole year, so this wasn't a problem. But when you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to want a glass of milk. (look it up)

• JEREMY: Now, do you want to go for two years? You'd save ten percent off the price.
• ME: No, just one year's fine.
• JEREMY: How long have you had this domain name?
• ME: Since last September.
• JEREMY: So you'll probably have it for a while.
• ME: Yeah, but I'm trying to see if I can land a better domain. Someone snagged JacobKing.com without the K in the middle, so I'm just going on a--... I just want one year.
• JEREMY: Okay, sure, that's perfectly fine.

You're damn right it's perfectly fine.

• JEREMY: Okay, I've put it in, and with your authorization, I will hit the 'submit' button.
• ME: Yes.
• JEREMY: Okay. Now is there anything else I can do for you today?
• ME: No, I think that's it--
• JEREMY: I'm just gonna check your account here and see if there's anything else I can help you with.

Wait, what?

• JEREMY: Now, how do you keep track of traffic on your website?
• ME: (I could say "Google webmaster tools," but I don't want to give him an opening to pitch the crappy site statistics package.) You know, I'm not really worried about that. I'm pretty busy right now, and I just want to have the site out there, and I'm not--... I don't need to track traffic.
• JEREMY: Okay, that's fine. I can also get you our special search engine submission offer, where GoDaddy automatically registers your web site with 250 search engines, so you only have to put in your information once instead of 250 times.
• ME: (I didn't even know 250 search engines existed. Everyone uses Google anyway.) No, that's okay. We've taken care of everything for today.
  

At this point, the call wraps up. In retrospect, I shouldn't have used him to sign up for a year of hosting, because it just gave him motivation to sell me a bunch of crap. If I'd been a pushover and allowed him to sell me stuff I don't need, the phone call would have continued.

• JEREMY: Great. I'll just add those to your order. Now, would you like to upgrade your bandwidth? If your site starts getting lots of traffic, you don't want to get cut off for going over the limit.
• ME: Well, it's just a digital portfolio, I don't really expect a lot of throughput... well, okay.
• JEREMY: I can offer you 100 terabytes of throughput per month for $500
• ME: That's a little steep, but, okay.
• JEREMY: Okay. Now, are you interested in JacobKing.co.sg? Singapore's tech market is really starting to take off.
• ME: I guess I wouldn't mind having a domain name in Singapore.
• JEREMY: And how about all the other countries?
• ME: I suppose.
  
• JEREMY: Great. That'll just be $250 for all the other available country domain names. It was actually $350, but I marked it down for you.
• ME: I appreciate it.
• JEREMY: Do you need anyone to do your laundry?
• ME: I do my own laundry...
• JEREMY: It's only 99 cents per week.
• ME: Oh, in that case, sure.
• JEREMY: Great. Now, there is a one-time service charge of $500, so I'll just add that on. It will totally pay for itself, because we handle your bedsheets, comforters, and if you have any couch covers, we'll do those, too.
• ME: Oh.
• JEREMY: I can also get you season tickets to Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas.
• ME: I live in Indianapolis.
• JEREMY: Well, this covers every show on the strip, good for a whole year.
• ME: I don't know...maybe?
• JEREMY: Great. It's going to be $1500 for every three months. I'll just add that in for you.
• ME: ...
• JEREMY: How about a replica B-52 stealth bomber?
• ME: A what?
• JEREMY: It doesn't fly, but it's really a great conversation piece at dinner parties.
• ME: I live in an apartment.
• JEREMY: Well, this is a really great value, and I don't want to see you miss out.
• ME: I don't really have any interest in the stealth bomber.
• JEREMY: I understand, but you never know when a situation comes up, and then it's right there. It's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
• ME: ...no-- I don't--....fine.
• JEREMY: Fantastic. It's just $250,000. It would be more, but you're saving a lot of money by not having jet engines or electronics installed.
• ME: I can't afford that. I'm still looking for a job.
  
• JEREMY: Not a problem. I can run in an application and see what kind of a credit line we can get you.
  
• ME: ...ok?
• JEREMY: Here we go. You are approved for $500 a month, my man. Only a 5% interest rate, so you'll have that baby paid in no time.
• ME: .........
• JEREMY: Have you ever considered investing in the moon?
• ME: .............
• JEREMY: I know what you're thinking... not possible, right? With the power of capitalism, my friend, that white ball in the sky can be all yours.
• ME: ...............
  
• JEREMY: Sir? Are you still there?

At that point, I've dropped dead of a heart attack. Salesmen suck.