My Experience With Booshaka

Note: This issue has since been resolved. I worked with the company to come up with an option that works for me and the service has been great thus far. I’ve been asked by the company twice to remove this post. It is accurate and truthful and describes my experience. Fortunately I think the company has learned from their errors and it taking strides to improve, however not only is my experience relevant, but I am simply not comfortable removing it just because they asked me to.

For many months I’ve used Booshaka’s top fan app to award my top fans. I’ve been very pleased with it and would gladly have paid $10/mo or so for the daily updates & features the free version offered. They offered an upgraded version, which didn’t add any value to me (for my needs.) Rates were $49/mo (now $99/mo based on the # of fans I have.)

Right now on a good month, I earn enough affiliate income to pay my hosting fees, Mailchimp fees, Feedblitz fees, prizes, shipping and a few other recurring expenses. $49+ for something that doesn’t earn me money or add value is not something I can spend.

I am well aware that I wasn’t paying anything for the app so I can’t expect too much from it. In January, the app stopped updating for me and many others. I complained, and I wasn’t alone. Their suggestion was to upgrade, as the free accounts wouldn’t update as regularly, but the pro version would update up to 4 times per day. One month I ended up just offering flash giveaways throughout the month rather than award top fans since I couldn’t count on the app working.

After I sent another message, the app started updating daily again, and I began offering top fan prizes again. All was well until April 26th when it stopped updating. I sent yet another message and received the following reply:

“As of January we had to make a conscious decision to change how we prioritize our page processing. With that said, we can no longer guarantee that users with a Basic (free) account will see regular updates. In order to ensure that your Leaderboard refreshes consistently, we recommend upgrading to the Pro version.”

In my opinion, this is a valid business decision. However, they should have notified users of their app so they could look for another solution if they decided not to upgrade. Additionally, it is extremely frustrating that they would leave users hanging mid/end month. A company with good service who valued their customers would give notice so any monthly contests could be finished.

They’ve closed posts from others on their Facebook page, but looking at comments on their posts, I’m not the only one unhappy with their company.

What’s sad about all this is that if they’d sent a message or notification in January that they wouldn’t be supporting the free version any longer, offering an upgrade to pro or offering a $10 or so per month plan that simply offered the same functionality of the free version with with daily updates. I would have paid it in a heartbeat. Instead, they’ve left us all hanging, telling half truths (it won’t update “as often”) and in my opinion, purposely updating until almost the end of the month. This leaves some of us who have made promises to fans that we can’t keep.

Now compare this to Rafflecopter. Back when the only option was the free version, I was sending emails asking to please let me pay them or donate. The app and support were that good. I have the blogger version of Rafflecopter now and I feel like I get far more than my money’s worth.

I’ll wait one more day to see if it updates for April so I can award top fans prizes as planned (now it shows that it updated today, but the numbers are the same as they were for the 4/26 update.) If not, I’ll find a way to award prizes that will satisfy everyone who was trying for the top 20.

Update: They have redeemed themselves. They replied to me and acknowledged that they should have notified me in January and have come up with a solution that meets my needs and budget.