Negotiating with Shared Use companies
Most of the things I’ve detailed here don’t work as well on a shared use owner/squatter. They know these things and they only want one thing, money! But the time thing will definitely work with them, because they will always ask a lot more than the lowest they’re willing to release it for. And NEVER agree to renting a number unless you have the ability change phone companies or you’re willing and able to just walk away from the number at any time. Because otherwise they can raise up the usage, and/or the monthly fee to anything they want after a few years when the contract runs out. And believe me, some companies will definitely take advantage of you! One of the easiest ways to tell if that’s the case is to try to figure out who the owner of the shared us company is. If they intentionally hide that, there’s probably a good reason such as very upset customers and legal problems. Another good thing to look at is their contract. Is it written to give them all of the power and to protect them and leave you with nothing? (put link to Red Flag article here)
We can’t negotiate very well with shared use companies because, even though several of them use our service. That’s probably because they’re trying to charge a lot more per month just to rent a number than our one time activation fee to “own” it, even before you figure in their inflated usage charges. They also don’t like our open and honest informational approach, because an educated consumer is their worst customer.
(2 votes, average: 2.00 out of 5)
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Marc Fraga says:
February 20, 2008 at 8:44 pm
I have a couple of 800 numbers that I would like to list with you to lease geographically around the country. Do you offer such a service and if so, what is the commission structure?
Thank you,
Marc Fraga
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
February 20, 2008 at 9:01 pm
No, we don’t offer shared use numbers. We do list third party numbers and simply refer people to the owner of the number. There is a post about our 3rd party number listings it in the Lookup section if you’re interested. There are also a few companies that do shared use routing services like what I think you’re looking for.
800-Telesmart
800-ADEPT
800-PATHWAYS
Swift Reach Networks
Call Source
Also consider Kall8 or McLeod USA if you want to get started cheaply managing it yourself. I’ll add a post about this later with more information after we have the Directory system working.
I’m not against shared use in all situations, but I wrote an article recently about the downside of shared use goes into several of the problems to avoid with shared use which you might want to read if you haven’t already too.
.Bill Quimby.
Jonathan Harris says:
April 7, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Can you recommend some companies to contact which can lease me a premium number in the Lafayette, LA DMA area? I am using 800 Hurt 911 for a lease fee in other markets but I need a number for this specific market. I have contacted DIAL 800 but what wanted seemed way ridiculously expensive for numbers that really weren’t good enough. Thanks.
Jonathan Harris
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
April 7, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Jonathan,
I know shared use is popular in the legal industry but I really don’t recommend shared use for anyone. Here’s a post from a similar question on shared use 800 negotiations. You wouldn’t build a house on someone else’s rented land would you? Because that’s what you’re doing if you rent someone else’s number and advertise it. The more you advertise it the more at their mercy you become. And that almost always creates a bad situation.
If you feel you don’t have any alternative, be extremely careful. Their contracts aren’t written to be fair, they’re written to give them all of the control and power and to insure that you have none. You’re really better off being more creative and if you’re trying to build a brand name, find something you can own. Otherwise you’re just building someone else’s name with every dollar you spend in advertising.
You should really try our Keyword Lookup yourself right from the homepage at TollFreeNumbers.com. Or even better try the Advanced Keyword Lookup at http://www.TollFreeNumbers.com/keyword/. It’s a great tool to find all of the options for any keywords. Put in your state abbreviation in front of generic terms. Use your names too, not just generic terms. Be creative and put in lots of small simple terms and beat on the Keyword Lookup. And you’ll OWN any number find for less than the monthly rent for a shared number that you never own or control!
.Bill Quimby.
James Drage says:
April 19, 2008 at 7:42 am
I have a client who is interested in the toll free number 1-800-479-5625 for their business. You list as being with a squatting company since 08. What would it cost to actually get the number or is it a “lost cause” that I should tell them to choose / find something else? Thanks in advance. Your service is incredible.
James Drage
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
April 19, 2008 at 10:16 am
James,
There’s really no way to tell you exactly what someone in shared use is going to want for a number, whether they will only rent it or if they’ll ultimately sell it outright. Many of them will ultimately sell it if they don’t have anyone else using it, but they will use shared use as a way to claim it’s worth $10,000 a month if they rented it in 100 area codes for $100 a month or something ridiculous like that.
Some will insist on renting it mainly because that ultimately gets them much more money in the long run than anybody would ever pay up front for a toll free number. You may think $50,000 is a lot up front and that $500 a month sounds better, but once you’ve put it onto your trucks, your yellow pages and advertised it for a while and they double the rate a couple times, you’ll find yourself paying several thousand a month and couple years later you’ve paid well over $100,000 because now you’re stuck and have invested so much into it.
So just be careful that you don’t get into rental quicksand. And whatever number they start out at, know that there are no book values in this business so you can probably get it for between 25 and 50% of the numbers they throw out at first if you negotiate long enough.
It’s not that all shared use is a “lost cause”. Some shared use companies are definitely more of a problem than others. And if you need it nationwide, or don’t have deep pockets, shared use is definitely not the way to go. You also have to realize the real danger of building your business on someone else’s property.
They may have a nice website and seem very reasonable up front, but when you put yourself at anyone else’s mercy it almost inevitably creates a conflict and leads to abuse. The only question is how abusive are they going to be. In this case, 800-479-5625 is with Rollinium, which I describe as (a big # squatting) company. They are one of the worst in the shared use business which is really saying something.
All you have to do to get your answer about how abusive are they going to be is try to find out who owns that business. You won’t find anything but dead ends and PO Boxes. If that doesn’t prove the point, just read their contract. It gives them ALL the power and guarantees that you will always be at their mercy with no rights at all, no matter what. I could go on, but will leave it at that.
Rollinium along with a couple other companies are also being investigated by some authorities. I can’t say anything more except that they are being even more paranoid and bunkered down than normal.
If you were driving by and saw a house that you really loved and decided you wanted to buy but they didn’t want to sell it what would you do? The best alternative in that situation is simply just to look around for other similar homes. Most people assume that one house they saw first is the best and that no other house could be as good as that one. It may take some work and some time to get over your first true love, but there are actually a LOT more options for ANY business than the owners ever realize at first. You just have to be more creative and more thorough and maybe more patient too.
I’ve said this before but my best advice is still, to try our Keyword Search at http://www.TollFreeNumbers.com/keyword/ with a lot of short simple keywords and let the computer dream up and check thousands of numbers. It’ll email you a list of the ones that are available or going to be available that will make it much easier. Be more creative and think outside of the box. Try thinking up creative slogans, not just ways to describe your business.
Bill
Nick Slenkovich (1 comments.) says:
January 17, 2009 at 11:55 pm
I have an 800 number that matches my local phone number (except the area code)–both 303-783-1000 and 800-783-1000. Because these numbers both match each other, I’d like to keep them. But we get an inordinate number of mis-dialed numbers from the pacific northwestern US region as a major customer service number is close to our 800 number and people misdial our number.
Are you able to use call routing such as is offered in your “numbers for shared usage” service that would allow us to restrict the calling area that would connect with our number to the region including only Colorado and the surrounding states?
Thanks
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
January 20, 2009 at 2:08 am
Hi Nick,
Almost any phone company can block areas of a toll free number. Ask your current phone company, because they probbly can block areas it for you if you want it.
If not, try Kall8.com. They give you good geographical controls.
Bill
Moe Pop (1 comments.) says:
January 27, 2009 at 10:23 pm
Can you recommend a company that I can use for setting up my toll free vanity for “shared usage”
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
January 28, 2009 at 12:38 am
Moe,
This is certainly worthy of a seperate post. But I’ll start with an answer here. You can go to companies that do all of that for you like Telesmart.com or CallSource.com. You can also go to some of the shared use companies as well, like Dial800.com or ResponseMarketing.com.
But if I were starting a shared use program I would probably start it with more of a self serve solution like Kall8.com and manage it myself for the first couple customers. That way I’m not spending more than I’m making on it.
Too many people assume the sales will be easy so they think they need to do everything else perfect or just out source everything and then sell hundreds of customers. And when those hundreds of customers don’t show up they are stuck with bills to manage customers that didn’t materialize. So start simple and small and don’t get someone to manage it for you until there’s something to manage.
That’s just my two cents.
Bill
J Goldblatt says:
May 27, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Hi, Bill,
I was looking at a number, found it to be controlled by a shared use co. they said I could exclusively lease it for 5 years with their whiz-bang service contract attached (tracking, recorded conversations, etc.) for $300/mo. and then keep the number with no further obligation to pay. Have you heard of this? My thoughts are, as long as the contract is not one-sided and they cannot change the rate agreed on, I can ‘lease-to-own’ over time. Would like to purchase upfront, but not sure if they want that yet or i can even hit the #.
Bill Quimby (678 comments.) says:
May 28, 2009 at 8:27 am
They’re using shared use as a way to get around regulations against hoarding and brokering. It means they have it with nobody using it. If you want to pay 30 to 40 thousand dollars for the number you can. I say that instead of the $18000 in fees it sounds like you’re paying because they usually make about half the money on the monthly service and half on the fee. I don’t know what the rate is but it’s certainly more than the rate would be if you owned the number and could pick your own carrier.
You could also just say that you’ll give them some amount (maybe 5 to 10K up front) because you need to use a different service without their whiz bang junk. They don’t have anyone using the number now, and if you take your time they’ll certainly do it for a lot less, especially if it’s up front. Or offer them $100 a month for the number for 5 years if you want it but they’ll still make the premium for the service too.
You have to realize that NOBODY else is offering them ANYTHING for that number and just offer them more than they are willing to walk away from it for. The price is always very negotiable on this because there’s no book value or alternate buyer coming along any time soon for this the way there is for your car.
The fallback have a powerful attorney write them a letter saying that they don’t have any end user for this number and that you demand that they turn over the number immediately or you will file a formal complaint with the FCC. Their contract shows that they are brokering the number in violation of the FCC regulations since they are essentially trying to sell it to you. They are clearly doing what the regulations are designed to prevent. I don’t know if you’ll end up with the number or not but it’s possible.
Bill