Hit Web Design review: bad business to work with/for! abc4 news utah will expose! 528

I was sent the above e-mail, and after reading it you can see into the mind of Hit Web Design's ownership. A lot of masked threats.

An open letter to Brad Strong.

I remember interviewing with HIT many years ago, when HIT was just getting it's legs and stemming off of AIM Mortgage. You had some great ideas, intense enthusiasm and a desire to make a positive impact on Utah County's economy.

I declined the offer of a job because I thought the company was too young, we actually discussed it and you made the offer an open ended offer. A few years went by and as I realized that risk in the market was unavoidable I came to work for you.

Shortly thereafter you handed the reins to the Aitken brothers and with the momentum you had built they appeared to do well. But 100k days slowly turned to 95 and the downward trend continued. 80. 75.

When it became clear that revenue was not going to reverse itself, the inexperienced Aitken boys began toying with org charts to try and reverse the process. 70k. I'm not sure how they decided shuffling people around would help bring money in the door, but they were earnest in the effort. 65k.

YEARS of mismanagement have trickled revenue away. October 26th, 2009 we hit 55k by noon, a record by my estimate and what happens?
Org chart bingo. Sales froze around 57 when news of the shuffle was learned.
I also quit on the 26th. It became obvious that th Aitken's really have no idea how to turn this ship around.

Brad. When will the Aitken boys learn that true change comes when you take responsibility yourself? When will you hold them responsible? When will the fear, lies and employee shuffling stop?
Brad, when will you come back?

All,

I am growing more and more concerned each day with our performance. We are consistently missing goal and see very few people who even stay to help. This team is currently missing its goal by 5k per day putting us on a pace to fall 100k shy from our goal. I don’t know if you just believe we can go on doing this forever or you maybe just don’t realize the affect this has however where we have to correct it now or I have to make changes. I can no longer continue to pay out the commission levels to this team that I am without you fighting to get to 30k per day with at least 12-15k upfront.

Consider this my final call to action, my final plea before drastic changes are made to the commission structure. I simply cannot pay the wages I do without you guys delivering the cash flow to do it. I love and respect all of you and would not be doing this if it wasn’t necessary.

David Aitken

CEO
HIT Web Design
www.hitwebdesign.com

We are finally at 2:00 and can start killing it again. Day shift you have $13, 761 to go to fulfill your commitment. That means we need you guys to start doing $4, 587 per hour starting this very next hour to avoid a situation of having to sacrifice personal time to get it done.

I for one vote for doing it during normal business hours.

David Aitken

CEO

HIT Web Design

www.hitwebdesign.com

Wow looking back at these emails makes me laugh because we were so scared of what was going to happen if we didn't stay that we all missed so many hours with our families and for what more money in there pockets! Wow we were brain washed!

Thank you all4money! That is very revealing!

All,

As you are all aware, Dave sent an email outlining our expectations in regards to overall revenue and upfront needs. I want to reiterate the critical nature of these numbers. As you are also aware, the downturn in the production from the PD team has the very real potential to put us in a very difficult position in relation to our cash flow. As Dave stated, if you continue to perform at these numbers we simply cannot continue to compensate at the same levels.

We are aware of the efforts that some of you are putting into your careers here at HIT. We are grateful to those of you that are striving and sacrificing and working many long hours to hit your goals and to excel. Thank you to those of you who are doing so.

Dave has extended his deadline by one day. Beginning Friday, October 16, you must hit an overall number of $30, 000 in revenue with a bare minimum of $12, 000 up front to continue to reap the rewards of the extremely generous commission structure that is currently in place. As long as you as a team continue to hit these numbers, the structure will stay in place. If it is missed for one day, the following day, the new commission structure will lock in moving forward. If you find yourselves as a team in that new commission structure be aware that we will not be moving back to the old structure.

The new commission structure is as follows:

Any sales that do not pay at least 50% upfront will only be paid out as HIT is paid.

All commission rates will be based upon Revenue per Day.

Under $1000 per day will commission at 0%

$1000 to $1749 per day will commission at 5%

$1750 to $1999 per day will commission at 10%

$2000 to $2499 per day will commission at 12%

Above $2500 per day will commission at 15%

Again, let me reiterate that the structure will only go into effect if you do not hit the revenue numbers. It would certainly be in your best interests to simply generate the 30K with 12K upfront.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email or call me. And as always, the door to my office is open.

Joshua B. Hoecherl
Chief Performance Officer

This is getting fun now! Karma can be a real bugger, they have to be squirming in their chairs at this point, this is great.

We need to hit at least 50 complaints a day, if you don't I will nail your ### to the chair and you will not leave, I don't care if you are coughing up blood, your dog just died, or your wife is having a baby we have to hit our goal or I will be forced to make drastic changes. I know we can do it...oh how sad is this...this is Nazi Dave And Jeremy until my next e-mail

wirth a looksee.

http://twitpic.com/n65ox/full

That image is pretty hilarious. Thank you Zippy for sharing!

hen I say respond I am not talking about the woot woot I am with you, got your back statements that are often sent out to an email like this. I am looking for your sincere thoughts and I would like everyone to really consider what I am about to discuss and let me know where you stand.

P.D.’s,

When we moved your goal back to 30K from 38K we were hitting that number on a regular basis with the same sized team. When we moved the goal back we all of a sudden (and I mean the same day) started struggling to hit it. We are now on a very similar path to previous months where we start to struggle to hit 70% of that number.

I think we all know how good this team is and our leads are the same as ever before. I get concerned when we continue to walk into the same trap every day without making the necessary adjustments to right the ship. The challenge we are running into day in and day out right now are very slow starts. We are running around 4-5k at noon when we should be at 10-12k. We are also often able to rally into a decent day but never all the way into goal.

The problem we have to address right now and starting today is why we are getting out of the gates so slow and how do we correct this so we stop finding ourselves in this position?

Failure to hit goal should not be something we even consider as a possibility especially after dropping it clear down to 30K. I need everyone making it happen 9-5 so that we are not put in a position of asking people to sacrifice to turn the day from horrible to bad. That’s right, we are getting so far behind that even a great rally and all of the committed extra time only drags our numbers up to the bad stage. I for one know this team is capable of figuring this out and getting off of this nasty rollercoaster.

FYI,

The first 3 weeks of last month you accomplished this without problem so we know its possible.

Closers,

Your production numbers are far more predictable and you are hitting goal regularly which I appreciate more than you will know. However, once we are at that goal we see our production drop through the floor whether it be 4:30 or on a good day we will see our production drop of as early as 3:00.

Goals are simply a needed number, however when the opportunity rises to really exceed goal we need your team to stay just as focused and determined to put numbers up as you where in getting there.

All,

Our positions are often dictated by our minds and our ability to drive and control our own human nature. I really don’t want to see us fall into bad habits or begin to fail either by effort or by numbers again.

Closers,

You are on this team because you are the best at what you do, don’t let a drop in effort or focus take away from what you have.

P.D.’s,

You remain on this team because you are the best at what you do, I fear that old bad habits may be creeping in. Please remember who you are, what makes you great and the way we do it at HIT. (with a lot of fun and enthusiasm)

I wonder since now Greg Woods is no longer employed with Hit Web Design, if he would be willing to enlighten us with some more stories about the Horrors of Hit Web Design?

since heritage is making 1.6 Million dollars in residual income each month, they should immediately reverse our pay-cuts. Greedy AHs.

Can anyone else on here speak to these numbers? I know that Hit Web Design on their site has hosting from 19.00 to 59.99

If they do indeed have the 20, 000 customers that they claim that would mean that every month they are generating $400, 000 off of hosting fees.

Then from what I can gather from the other e-mails that have been shared with me here, is that their goal is to hit 30, 000 a day in sales (which is down from 100, 000 a day) they should be making 720, 000 a month in new revenue from their sales team.

Then if they are making another 30, 000 a day from their customer service teams (account management and closers... please correct me if I am wrong) means another 720, 000

Which means monthly ball park they should be making
400, 000 - hosting
720, 000 - sales
720, 000 - customer service
1, 840, 000 total a month

Which would equal about 22, 000, 000 a year... so being the fact that they state that their yearly revenue is 20, 000, 000 we can assume these numbers are fairly accurate.

if we take out 100, 000 for pay per click marketing (thank you internet) and another 200, 000 for server maint, bill etc per month that leaves them with a net revenue of

1, 540, 000 a month so if every full time employee was paid equally the average monthly salary would be $6, 160.00 which means that the average employee salary would be $73, 920.00 a year.

But being the fact that all employees are not paid equally... and people are posting on here that the frontline person is making $8.50 an hour we can assume that what Heritage Web Solutions and Hit Web Design are running into plain and simple is a failed business model.

As a national average the average cost per employee for health care for a year is about 10, 000 for a company the size of Heritage.

So per year Heritage spends $2, 500, 000.00 on health insurance for it's employees
Per year we will estimate Heritage spends $3, 600, 000.00 on server rentals Pay per click campaigns etc.
That leaves from the 22, 000, 000.00 - 15, 900, 000 for salaries in-house and outsourced.
From that 15, 900, 000 y0u have to pay your out sourced employees. Seeing that most people can't live on it, and from reading on here, and other sites where people detail out the cost per page is 10.00 (please correct me if I am wrong) and they create 1, 000 websites per month with an average length of 5 pages per site we will estimate (with writing etc) that each site costs Hit Web Design about 100.00 to make. That means that you subtract another 1, 000, 000.00 a year for that expense.

So we are left with a grand total 14, 900, 000.00 for in-house salaries.
The one thing I have haven't taken into account are refunds because we are going to pretend that this is the perfect world where everyone is satisfied with Heritage like they want to pretend.

That means that if everyone was paid equally the average employee would make $59, 900.00 (for all of the 250 in-house employees).

Now being the fact that we know that the front line customer service is make 8.50 an hour (not including a bonus... and from what I have read they need to sell 2, 000.00 a day to make the 10% bonus which would equal out to each person selling 48, 000.00 a month)

So if we average out long term employees who are making more vs. less and using a phone list that someone sent me we can guesstimate that 210 out of those 250 employees fall into this category. And if we say that on average they make 12.50 an hour that would equal out to 26, 000.00 a year per employee which equals out to a total $5, 460, 000.00

Subtract that from our total and we have a whopping 9, 440, 000.00 a year left over for the sales people, a few programmers, management, VPs, and the owners.

So where is the money going? How mismanaged is this company? If I was an owner and I saw this I would storm over to my CFO's office and demand he/she account for all the money spent!
Either that or they are sending too much money to Haiti.

Plain and simple this company is mismanaged. By all accounts if people are as happy with Hit Web Design as they say they are, there is some sort of money scheme going on. Or else they have a lot more refunds due than they are letting on!

This just does not add up for. If I am missing any piece of the puzzle or my math is off please let me know.

Because with as many people who have had bounced checks, and issues getting, paid, along with the 15% reduction in pay, the numbers just don't make any sort of sense.

Comments?

I think they might be playing this hand with all of us "If we ignore them they will go away" I say BS we keep pouring it on until something is done. C'mon guys, girls HELL NO WE WONT GO, HELL NO WE WONT GO, actually that is not a bad idea let's all get together and picket in front of the building

I agree with you EthicsCommitee.

The louder we get about the treatment of employees and customers of Hit Web Design, the more likely the media, Utah Attorney General's Office, and the BBB will investigate Hit Web Design and it's unethical practices.

Keep posting your experiences and stories!

Good point Turpin!

If you put 1, 000 sites live a month that means that yearly you put 15, 000 sites live.

If you have a customer base of 20, 000 clients that means that rolling only 5, 000 clients are clients who are staying past their year agreement which means using their marketing numbers alone they have a retention rate of only 25%

WOW Only 25% of Hit Web Design's customers decide to stay with them after their 1 year contract is up! That in itself is VERY TELLING.

The one problem with those numbers is that they have a closer team that after a site is sold calls back and sells a year of hosting to the client. They offer 2-3 months free hosting if they pay upfront for a year. So now they are losing there set monthy residuals.

Why people doesn't leave work when things are as bad as they are at Hit? I think that has to do a lot with the economy crisis. If these employees could find other decent companies out there they would had leave a long time ago. The same way, when the unemployment is high some companies, like HIT, take advantage. Who cares if your employees are leaving every day when you can have 1000 more candidates to interview next day.

By the way, I do have proofs of all these complains. This is just for Ryan so you know that it'll come out, but not here. You will be probably the first one to know.

Well, looking at that math is just odd. I remember when I was working at HIT there were many days that we struggled to hit 30 live sites a day. Using that as a gauge it couldn't have been more than 700 sites a month (30 x ~23 business days a month). I was also fired completely out of the blue with no final warning or anything, just asked to go to the HR office while they cleared my desk. I'm actually grateful for them doing this because at the time (almost a year ago) the prospect of getting a new job that payed as well seemed slim. Within 2 weeks I began work at a job that I consider to be superior to what I was doing at HIT. Shortly after losing my job at HIT I decided to fold and join Facebook. I quickly requested to be friends with many of my co-workers that I had known in my time there. I then received a letter from a legal office on behalf of HIT stating that I couldn't communicate with any current employee or client of HIT as doing so would lead to legal action taken against me. Are you serious? I can no longer talk to my best friend for 25 years (whom I referred to HIT, was very good at his job and regularly exceeded goals and was also 'let go' due to some farce of a reason) without fear of legal ramifications?

I would be interested to know if any other former employees received a similar letter.

First of all, I am not related to anybody at HIT Management and this is just my personal opinion.

All of you are just, recently terminated employees for various reasons including excessive tardiness, performance, attitude etc. Its very common for disgruntled employees like you to react inappropriately in public forums, hiding behind the internet. Think about it, if you were so good, why would anybody ever fire you? You were happy till you were well fed, as soon as you are brought down to earth to face the reality, your flip out. It's none of your concern and you are not entitled to a stake in the residual income if your contract and terms of employment does not mention it. Lets just be real, if your employment is at will, any company has right to let you go without asking you. If you felt you were not appropriately treated while being employed at HIT, you should be free to take suitable action and the company would have replied to the claims.

Remember the ones who are currently working are better than you were, so instead of wasting time on forums and talking crap about your ex-employer, get a life and move on.

idiotswillalwayscomplain,

I didn't get fired. I got sick of unethical business practices, team leads with a God complex, every ten minutes hearing team leads yelling "stay green". The constant pressure of trying to get a sell even if the customer needed it or not.

I think it's a little interesting that you are hiding behind the internet, if you have no relation to HIT web design why did you not put your name? I guess it might be because you wouldn't stand up for something you feel strongly about. I hope I am not being mugged when you are walking by, it sounds like you don't have the heart to come and try to help your fellow man out.

EthicsCommitee,

There is no reason to help to fired employees or quitters (read losers). The day I don't do my job right, I will expect any employer to fire me. Move on! the company will go on, with or without you!

the ones who have left have left for better pay or personal reason ( I would do too) and nothing else, get real!

idiotswillalwayscomplain,

If you read through these pages of complaints, you'd see that a good amount of us did actually quit because of how ridiculous Heritage has become. I am another who did, as you'll see from my post earlier and I can vouch for several other employees who quit for similar reasons and we all gave those reasons when we gave our two weeks notice (as well as bringing our issues up with management several times before quitting).

Some of us are hiding behind the internet because we don't want to be subject to Heritages brute force/legal pressure tactics, which they do use (don't tell me you've never been told to tell a customer that if they do such-and-such, Heritage will take legal action, because I had to say it at least once a week while I worked there). Heritage has lots more money to hire a lawyer than I do, so I'd rather not take the chance that they'll try to take me to court for "slander" or "libel" or whatever. But I can say to you with utmost honesty that I QUIT working (I gave two weeks notice!) at Heritage because it became ridiculous to work there, for many reasons stated already, but mostly because Heritage wanted me to focus on intimidation selling to customers rather than providing them with good customer service (despite me being in the customer service/tech support department) and because they made me feel like my job status was unpredictable if I didn't hit the newly implemented sales quotas. Not to mention policies kept changing and morphing randomly, which makes it extremely unpleasant to work for a company.

But keep telling yourself that we're all disgruntled, fired employees. Whatever makes you feel good about working for Heritage! I know I'm not a fired employee, and so I certainly tend to believe that these others here saying they were not fired weren't as well. Those who were fired have stated as such.

diotswillalwayscomplain

You are really passionate about this are you sure you don't work there. You are so right, I will never comment or have an opinion ever again, you have really enlightened all of us. What was I thinking...so stupid. Go and be a troll on another post...you get real! And once again you post without a name...hmmmmm

Well, first of all, read above, I said I have no relationship with HIT management, that doesn't mean I am not concerned or loyal or whatever.

Secondly if you are hired to do a job, it depends on you, how you do it to reach from point A to Point B is not really a concern, reaching to Point B is.

BB

well? Wow did you think of that all by yourself?

idiotswillalwayscomplain,

with all of your spelling errors, I'd venture to say this is one of the Aitken brothers. Your whole preface of "no relation to any HIT Management" is just another lie.

I was one that was let go. Why? Some bull faced crap lie. Think I'm lying? Ask the former manager of Human Resources the REAL reason she quit. She was tired of being a pawn and forced to fire people for "bull crap" reasons! If this company is so good in your mind, and we're just all bitter, I DARE you to come out of your office, walk down onto the now account manager floor (since you've done away with sales), and dial the phone and oh yeah, STAY GREEN! If you don't have the balls to do that (which I can assume as an Aitken you don't), shut up and you get a life!

"Secondly if you are hired to do a job, it depends on you, how you do it to reach from point A to Point B is not really a concern, reaching to Point B is."

The ends justify the means. Brilliant. You certainly nailed the management style.

Also I have no issues with any of you, I don't even know who you are, just like you don't know me. I may even leave when I desire or if I don't like something about my employers or If I get a better opportunity. I just don't like that ex-employees, screwing the careers or job of their ex-colleagues. You choose to leave, We haven't yet. We have to make our living and run our families, we are hurt by the way unethically all details are let out. You have problems with HIT fine, but by all this, understand the fact that it hurts other people, than the Management.

we are not hurting you - management is

idiotswillalwayscomplain,

I have no relation to the company, but what I do wake up and live for, is the ability to help those who have been victims of bullies, crooks, and unethical people.

I would say in this particular thread a MAJORITY of ex-employees posting here left of their own free will.

A few have been terminated. The few that were terminated that I have spoken to, have listed an number of unethical practices and shady reasons to why they were let go.

The people who left of their own free will, were lucky enough to get jobs at other companies.

The people posting who are still Hit Web Design employees are terrified of loosing their once source of income, but are ready to drop Hit Web Design like a bad habit the moment they have a new job.

Why would they "hide" on here? Well plain and simple most average people cannot afford to retain a lawyer or even get good legal advice. So why would they risk getting one of those infamous legal letters from Heritage Management?

Now idiotswillalwayscomplain I will bet that you are either an owner, or directly related to the Aitken family since we have openly discussed their inability to run a company.

So what you are saying is, you are currently working there. How can we stand by and let this company destroy other peoples lives, think about the small business owner getting bent over by this company. I can't tell you how many times I had to sit and hear my customer crying, actually crying on the phone because we didn't do what we say we could do, but we sure could sell them something they didn't need couldn't we.

I don't want to see them fail as a company, I want to see change, it's unethical what they are doing, it's just as bad as Enron.

I have no desire to see HIT fire all of its employees, by any means... but I do wish they would alter their style of business to be more customer oriented and less sales oriented. I felt, and many customers felt, that they were just kind of sucking their customers dry... pretty well forcing them to purchase things they didn't need... telling lies about how such and such will help them get more business on their website, when it really won't make a bit difference, and taking forever to get customers help with their sites or even get the sites finished in a timely manner. Also, I feel bad for the people working there at such pitiful wages. At this point, those who work there are forced to work there because there's no where else to go, and they have to deal with a business that is treating them like dirt and paying them pennies unless they force sales on their customers. I thought we got rid of sweatshops a long time ago, but it doesn't seem to be so at HIT. I wonder why sales suddenly drop once they hit their "goal" for the day... hmm... maybe because people HATE SELLING the way HIT wants them to sell... by taking advantage of customers and being annoyingly pushy, rather than offering a product when it feels like the right time to offer it and when the customer really does need it.

Just so you know the average employee at HIT right now makes a base of $8.50/hour. McDonald's pays $10.00/hour, better work environment, better benefits, less stress and free food! Tell that to the Aitken's when they tell you there's nothing else out there.

"I can't tell you how many times I had to sit and hear my customer crying, actually crying on the phone because we didn't do what we say we could do, but we sure could sell them something they didn't need couldn't we."

True dat. I hated it when that happened, and I couldn't do anything. And then I had to push some stupid sale on them. "Well, tell him/her that we can give them the Web Traffic Director for 5% off today and send a task to so and so." And I'd have to send a task and offer the WTD and tell them that someone would get back to them and fix it, which was technically true, but would probably take at least a week, if the person wasn't fired or quit in the meantime. And here's a business owner, trying to get a dang website up so they can make money, but HIT has pretty well screwed them over and left them with no recourse for getting their money back or getting a website that they like up in a decent amount of time. It was sad. Sad sad sad.

I have letters from a woman who was on social security and a slick sales person, called her up and sold her a website. The website was already outside of her means, but she was promised a quick return on her investment, and a brighter future...

What did she experience?

CONSTANT delays in her website design, different people calling her 2 or 3 times a day promising to get her site done quicker if she would just add one more thing to it!

Then when she would cave and give a little bit more money just so she could get her "hit" website done.

Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and with each month there was a hosting charge, and now bills started to fall behind.

When she wanted to cancel she was told she couldn't, was bullied and given the runaround.

Now she is trying to get her money back by doing a charge back and hopefully she will be able to recoup her money, not so that she can have someone else build her a website, so that she can plain and simple pay her bill, s and feed herself.

Does this sound like a company that you 'feel' proud to work for? SHAME on you! SHAME!

idiotswillalwayscomplain you know what is going on, yet you still support them. That is just plain wrong and sick in my eyes.

Customers always want to hear what they want to hear during the buying process, they always want to go for cheapest options, but as soon as they are contracted, they have this "everything for next to nothing" attitude. I don't think I have ever sold anything wrong to get my numbers. Goals and targets are the first things any sales person learns anywhere. There have been employees who have never been in sales before this job - who fail!

I personally think Heritage is an awesome company offering services at good price. You have to have it in you to do your job you are hired for. Up-selling is common in any industry, there is nothing wrong in it.

Ethicalhit, you claim that you are not an ex-employee ( I am 1000% positive that you are a current employee ) If you are so much concerned for nothing, go and volunteer with the UN or something.

We can all go back and forth "n" number of times, but the fact will not change that, all you guys are just brainwashed into getting a revenge. Again I am not related to HIT Management and have a general opinion about the problems you guys are causing others.

idiotswillalwayscomplain,

"Customers always want to hear what they want to hear during the buying process, they always want to go for cheapest options, but as soon as they are contracted, they have this "everything for next to nothing" attitude. I don't think I have ever sold anything wrong to get my numbers."

... I am also sure you did not dispel any misconceptions the customer had, as long as your ### was covered and you made the sale.