Podium Reviews & Product Details

The review solicitation piece is great. We've had a lot of success with automating this and have seen a nice jump in ratings across our locations. We've had very few issues with this side of the business.

The other features we utilize Podium for (Bulk Messaging and Feedback) have been very problematic. Prior to signing with Podium, we made sure to confirm the platform could handle the needs we have and were told yes. After signing, we very quickly realized that was not true. They have had to custom build/adjust almost all of what we do and even then have continued to have issues. We meet weekly, but it always feels that we have to meet 3-4 times to get one thing resolved. We're often told the issue has been fixed, then we go to try it, and it still doesn't work. After working with 10-20 vendors each year and rarely having to handle issues like these, it really seems they grew too fast and have been unable to scale their products to handle a business of our size.

Prior to Podium, we had slow review growth. Since implementing Podium, we've been able to increase total review numbers and overall ratings for most of our locations.

The site itself looks good and is mostly easy to navigate. Interfaced with our system so I could see if a review was sent/done.

Reporting is glitchy and awkward (that I can't just download the report from the site and have to have a link to the download emailed is weird, also customization is limited). Reviews attributed to the wrong people frequently, even when the link used by the reviewer is directly tied to a specific employee.

We catch client concerns and are able to address them. But I don't think the overall functionality makes it worthwhile and there are better services available.

I received many referrals. The contact info I received was correct as well.

Most of the referrals never planned out.

Allowing customers to get in contact when we are not available.

Absolutely nothing. Their lack of service after you sign the contract.

It doesn't work well at all if you have people in the field trying to get paid for the services you provide. Use someone else for credit card services if you use Service Titan no matter what they tell you! Podium Payments doesn't work with Service Titan! Podium Payments!

nothing

User interface and website are easy to use.

We are a small business that tried Podium to collect text-based payments. The software did not work as described. Podium sent ~200 payment reminders to our contacts, WITHOUT our authorization. Thus, we had 200 very confused & angry people. Thanks Podium! I demanded immediate cancellation & a refund because the software did not work. They agreed to cancel, but would only provide a partial refund. Bottom line, their technology is sloppy and caused a major headache for our people. Customer service is not great. Many other vendors to choose from in this area.

Text based payments. It did not benefit us and we terminated immediately.

the front page website real chat bot works well

Did not and does not integrate with our CMS and batching of data to allow use on an ongoing basis is not the same as integration and is time-consuming and cumbersome

When we requested another month of service after a required one month cancellation request for termination of services, they refused to contiunue service they and cut off service abruptly, it came across as spiteful.

Nothing. This is a terrible app for Healthcare function and use ability

You couldn't delete messages. The password function could not be done thru the app. The reps for podium had ability to fix any problems.. they only suggested to hide unwanted messages since you can not delete

Communication between employees. But this app fails in that regards

Podium integrated well with our point of sale software and had all the features we were looking for in a service of this type. would have been great if it actually worked.

The pushy and underhanded sales tactics and general lack of customer service were beyond belief. It's impossible to get a straight answer up front as to what the service will cost, but once you get on a sales call, you're hit with the "sign right now and get a discounted rate of ____". We weren't interested in being forced into a contract, so we declined at first. Later, we went back, negotiated a reasonable rate, and agreed to a month-to-month plan to try the service out. It was a fail from the start. We have multiple locations and were paying to have separate numbers for each, but the integration only worked at one. Weeks turned into months as we were shuffled between account reps, helpdesk, tech support, managers, etc. Every time we'd try to resolve the issue, we'd wait days for responses only to eventually be given new contact information for someone else who would be looking into it for us. After 3 months of paying for a service that only worked in a fraction of our locations, we sent an email to every contact we had for the company indicating that they had one week to correct the issue or we would be dropping. We heard nothing from them, so after the week, we emailed to cancel. At this point, we get the classic "what can we do to get you to stay?" customer service rep, but stayed firm - we were done paying for a service we weren't receiving. That SHOULD have been the end of it, but the next month... we were charged again. We reached out and were told it was a billing mistake. But then we were charged again.... and again. Three additional months of charges and a billing department that claimed it was unable to process refunds. We had to fight to get our money back and were prepared to simply file a chargeback with our bank. Start to finish, it was the worst customer service experience we've ever had with a B2B company.

None. We dropped them and are glad to be done. The best part of our relationship with podium was when we dropped them and moved on to a competitor that provided superior customer service.

The web chat works well to get information from your leads, but like there are some people that don't want to leave the email address, there are people that don't want to leave the phone number. Podium requires the person to leave his/her phone number.

The cost of the app is really high. I realized we were spending almost the same on Podium than on 10 CRM users. Also we never got to use the "reviews" module that asks customers to leave a review. We tried with 5 or 6 customers when we started using podium, and none of the customers were able to leave the review because they didn't have a gmail account, old phone, etc. We tried again a few months ago and the same happened. The main reason why we started using this app was because it came recommended from one of our vendors, and the salesperson that did the pitch was really good, so we ended up signing a 1-year contract to have an overpriced chat app in our website. Finally, the cancelation policy says that you have to tell them 30 days before, when other services allow you to cancel instantly and without having to contact support.

What they promise is that you will get a lot of reviews on google, facebook, etc, for free. You have to really work for those reviews because what they want is you to be with the customer when you are sending the review SMS, so you can guide the customer to leave the review. We couldn't manage to do that. Podium for us was a chat app for our website, but when we realized that the cost of it was around 10 time more that other chat apps, we decided to cancel the service.

The desktop and mobile app software are easy to use.

This company is impossible to reach. Support is terrible. We have had an issue for at least eight months. I have been trying to get somebody on the phone for the last two months. If I am lucky they will respond to an email. How can a company that specializes in helping companies earn reviews have such bad service? The concept is great, our staff likes the product, but support is abysmal. And, the product is not working as advertised and yet they continue to charge us. I would love to love this company if only they would be responsive.

We cannot reach a real person. Support is slow and non-responsive. Their integration with our CRM is not working and they acknowledged that the problem was on their end, but there is no ETA on a fix, they are non-communicative, and are doing nothing to make it up to us. Can't get anybody on the phone. I am put on hold everytime I call and then disconnected before I can reach a human.

The idea of generating leads and getting new business.

They lock you in for a year with no way to get out!

They haven't solved any problems for me! Waist of money!!!!

Nothing, unless you are a person to person business where you can encourage the customer on the spot to review you, this platform does not work effectively

Almost everything. Once they get you in with their 90 day trial which is actually 30 days free and then 60 charged at a ridiculous rate of $200+ USD ($290/month AUD), they will neither help or assist you. You MUST cancel within the first 30 days or you will be in contract for 12 months ($2400 USD/year for reviews!!!) We cancelled and they were fine with it and then boom, charged. When contested that we were told by Billy that we would not be charged for the 90 days as they were running off a 99% success rate and therefore the product would speak for itself. When it failed to perform, Billy had no recollection of who I even was??? I find it quite daunting that a Google Review based software does not actually have a Google review platform for us all to review!!! That rings alarm bells. If you do further research you will also see ex employees stating that all these review are from them as staff member as they are forced to review the company. THEY ARE FAKE in the their product performance

They refuse to offer any help. I contested their payments to which they informed me they would be billing me YET again. Once i informed them and gave them zero authority, they billed our company instantly (3 minute later we got the invoice receipt). the price was also in USD and not AUD so we were charged an additional $90. When we contested, they miraculously went silent. they dont

Absolutely nothing. I guess you can credit the sales team. The whole business model is to have a sketchy sales team to get you to sign a annual contract.

Everything. There is nothing good about this company. BE WARNED. They falsify their own reviews and do not value their customers. Stay far far away, A buggy platform a the worst company I have ever experienced working with in my 10+ years running a business

I have learned the value of customer service, as well as the precursor to a pushy sales team that will not consider anything shorter than a 1 year contract.

Their demo I guess. It seemed good in theory, which is why we signed on but I am struggling to find any positives since we made that mistake. It might work if you have a millennial-only client base.

Oh where do I start.... a) Spent two weeks going back and forth with their technical support to actually get the link being sent out to work in the first place. It felt as though we were the only suckers dumb enough to pay for their only partly functioning software. We were sending from iPhones and Android, how is it possible their system couldn't function on the most common devices??? It turned out that there were TWO separate issues. b) Our client base skews heavily towards the retirement set, so we had to spend so much time hand-holding to get them through the review process, we didn't need Podium to send the link in the first place. c) Even with all that hand-holding, numerous review that we WATCHED clients post, never actually showed up on Facebook or Google.... and this was not just the old folks. Even 20/30-somethings had issues. d) Podium's text-based system unintentionally encourages busy people to simply text back their review. We had perfectly intelligent young businessmen who we had asked to write a review via Podium, which they would do but by texting it back rather than posting it because they didn't take the time to actually read the one line message. Which means we then have to either abandon their review or write them back and say, hey I know you're really busy but could you actually click on the link this time and do it again?

We were a new business, so we needed to make our way to the top of Google search results. As mentioned previously, Podium was of virtually zero use.