WARNING: Don't Work With ADAMO Ads (21)
So this is gonna be a long story, TLDR summary at the end of this post...
Back in October 2014, Adamo had a promotion going on giving away uncapped 10 % bonuses on first deposits, so I wired €5000 to take full advantage of the bonus. This was way more than my usual test deposits for new traffic sources and in hindsight quite a big mistake on my end, but Adamo had a big brand presence at the time, sponsoring trade shows, being nominated for industry awards etc. which made them appear legit to me. Plus my account manager assured me that a refund would be no problem if I wasn’t satisfied with the traffic quality.
I ran a couple tests for around €500 with pretty bad results overall, so I decided to request a refund and focus on other traffic sources instead (around end of December 2014). That’s when an endless back and forth with my account manager, support etc began. There would be tons of excuses e.g. their accountant being sick, confusion about how to deduct the bonus from my refund, my AM trying to convince me to run more tests instead because “everybody else loves our traffic, I don’t know what’s wrong", and most of the time just complete radio silence.
After a while rumours started going around the industry that Adamo was in a bad financial situation, owing money for sponsorships etc., so things started to look worse and worse. I also slacked off a bit because I’m just not the kind of person to blast someone with messages each day, make public allegations etc., so basically nothing happened for a couple months.
They seemed to recover though and at a trade show in September 2015 I met my AM in person who promised to take care of it ASAP. He told me to forward the whole email thread to him and the CEO which I did, but once again radio silence for a couple weeks.
Then my AM left the company and I got a new person assigned to me, so I tried again in the hopes that it was my previous AMs fault and that the new one would finally take care of it.
Same thing though, endless back and forth, him saying that only the CEO can decide and that she won’t respond to him, telling me I should just contact her directly. So I did contact her directly through various channels (E-Mail, Facebook, Skype), but to this day haven’t gotten a single message back from her.
A couple weeks ago this AM quit as well and yesterday posted this on Facebook and another industry forum:
After I decided to leave the company Judy Shalom CEO of ADAMO I suppose decided that she doesn't need me anymore and that can be the reason of not paying salary for last worked month. I see these actions as unprofessional and short-sighted thus just would like to share with you this case. Imagine if it's ok attitude inside the company what attitude is to clients, publishers and advertisers?
If you have similar story with this company please make it public, if you think I'm moron and don't have the right to write the truth, your comments again welcome. If Judy has anything to say, it's more than welcome also.
No black PR here or anything, just a story to warn others and bring up the true.
I don’t wanna start a smear campaign or anything, but since said CEO seems to spend endless amounts of time and money for self promotion trying to get people’s votes for various industry awards etc instead of actually interacting with her customers, I decided it was time to make people aware of my case so they won’t have the same happen to them as well.
I can’t say for sure that the traffic is bad, it might even work for you, but in lieu of my bad overall experience I would strongly advise anyone against working with ADAMO.
What I definitely learned out of my mistake and hope you guys can also take away from this is to never trust a company based on fancy booths, company sponsorships or industry awards (which are just a big circle jerk anyways, people voting on things like "best traffic company" without ever having spent a single $ on traffic etc). So no matter how legit a company might appear, never deposit more than you are absolutely ok with losing for your first couple tests.
This is the first and only time I’ve ever had any serious dispute in my ca. 4 years in the industry, so while I am definitely lucky in that regard, any advice on how to handle this would be highly appreciated.
TLDR:
- I’ve had a mid €xxxx refund pending with Adamo since around December 2014
- Endless back and forth, 2 AMs quit in the process, one says the CEO refuses to pay his last month’s salary
- Apparently the CEO said to him that I am a cheater and that’s why they won’t refund me any money
- Never trust a company based on fancy booths at trade shows and industry awards
- Never deposit more than you are absolutely ok with losing into a new traffic source
- Advice on what to do next?
I can't advise what to do next, but I think it is best to out the fuckers as soon as you think something shady is going on. No need to be polite or accommodating. It is just business.
Also, never wire transfer money to anyone. Chargebacks and paypal disputes always come in handy when dealing with scammers. I have been a full time affiliate for 4yrs with 7 figure ad spend and I have not wired a single $ to anyone till date 
When you requested a withdrawal were you willing to give the initial bonus back? If you were willing to forfeit the bonus then they are completely in the wrong.
However if you just wanted your money back (ie full initial 5000 euros deposit after your initial 500 euro loss) and just played with house money, then I can see their beef with that.
Similar to online poker/casinos when you get a bonus you are expected to leave the cash there, and if you make an early withdrawal you're expected to forfeit the bonus.
Originally Posted by jabong82
€ 5000 deposit + € 500 bonus = €5500 initial balance
€500 spend * 10% = €50 used bonus
€500 bonus - €50 used bonus = €450 unused bonus
€5000 remaining balance - €450 unused bonus = €4550 refund
what I didn't mention in my OP is that they also subtracted the full €500 bonus amount from my account out of the blue without me even noticing at first:
needless to say, this wasn't an actual "refund" like it says on the dasboard that I received in any way, the money just disappeared from my account.
again though, the whole issue wasn't technicalities about the refund amount, I would've been ok with giving back the whole bonus or even giving them a discount if necessary, but rather them not communicating with me at all.
I have never worked with this company. in fact, I don't even know them or have heard of them before now.
But normally if disputes can't get resolved amicably, pursuing the matter through legal channels would be the next step.
Not sure what happened with them, they started of big, with large presence at adult shows, I even tested their traffic and it was quite good at some point. Then the quality went to shit so I stopped using them ... looks like they are not in the best condition.
i also got shit traffic from them. will never try them again after reading this. btw, you should also make this public on the gfy.com forum. it's the biggest adult forum.
Thanks for the warning. I have a good friend who couldn't get a refund in spite of multiple requests as well.
Fortunately I only have less than 100 euros left on that source. Their traffic converted quite well at one point and I made money there...and then traffic quality went downhill so I stopped running there.
I guess having to absorb this kind of unexpected loss is just a normal part of doing business, however unfair it may be to us advertisers.
Amy
Originally Posted by cmdeal
This is the first time I have publicly posted about the issue, so who knows, maybe they will decide to come out of the woodworks and finally pay me, knock-on-wood.
Also posted on GFY now, so anybody who had a bad experience with them as well, I'd appreciate your input there: http://gfy.com/fucking-around-and-pr...l#post21111895
Originally Posted by andyvon
Originally Posted by matuloo
I hope you get this resolved Andreas, you are always a pleasure to deal with. Seems your GFY thread has got their attention, fingers crossed for a successful resolution.
Originally Posted by trafficforce
After posting this on GFY, I quickly got their attention and hopped on a Skype call with their COO yesterday.
According to him, it was an unfortunate case of miscommunication and everything got sorted quickly. Apparently the issue with my former AM not getting paid his salary has another side to the story as well, but I won't comment on that since I don't know any details and it's also none of my business.
It's really unfortunate that I had to post this publicly in order to get it resolved and I still think that it's a big screw up on their end, but anyways, the refund has been processed and the money is already in my bank account, so consider this closed.
BTW: hmedia, thx for the GFY suggestion, if we ever meet in person feel free to order a couple alcoholic beverages on me 
Yes, Adamo is verified fake traffic. Never worked with them on a large scale and I wouldn't wire 5k with no guarantees after my experience with another similar company.
Originally Posted by andyvon
According to him, it was an unfortunate case of miscommunication and everything got sorted quickly. Apparently the issue with my former AM not getting paid his salary has another side to the story as well, but I won't comment on that since I don't know any details and it's also none of my business.
It's really unfortunate that I had to post this publicly in order to get it resolved and I still think that it's a big screw up on their end, but anyways, the refund has been processed and the money is already in my bank account, so consider this closed.
BTW: hmedia, thx for the GFY suggestion, if we ever meet in person feel free to order a couple alcoholic beverages on me
You will see all the former reps in Prague again... But I skip it this time!
Originally Posted by blueflag
You will see all the former reps in Prague again... But I skip it this time!
Originally Posted by andyvon
According to him, it was an unfortunate case of miscommunication and everything got sorted quickly. Apparently the issue with my former AM not getting paid his salary has another side to the story as well, but I won't comment on that since I don't know any details and it's also none of my business.
It's really unfortunate that I had to post this publicly in order to get it resolved and I still think that it's a big screw up on their end, but anyways, the refund has been processed and the money is already in my bank account, so consider this closed.
BTW: hmedia, thx for the GFY suggestion, if we ever meet in person feel free to order a couple alcoholic beverages on me
Originally Posted by matuloo
Originally Posted by andyvon
According to him, it was an unfortunate case of miscommunication and everything got sorted quickly. Apparently the issue with my former AM not getting paid his salary has another side to the story as well, but I won't comment on that since I don't know any details and it's also none of my business.
It's really unfortunate that I had to post this publicly in order to get it resolved and I still think that it's a big screw up on their end, but anyways, the refund has been processed and the money is already in my bank account, so consider this closed.
BTW: hmedia, thx for the GFY suggestion, if we ever meet in person feel free to order a couple alcoholic beverages on me
Originally Posted by matuloo
If you wanna have the beer with somebody else and shoot some nice guns let me know, we have the shooting range again https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.n...54779804_o.jpg
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