ROADvertise is one of Creatine Marketing's longest listed clients. The trouble is, the half done work that actually still exists, is at best another incomplete project from dates before Creatine Marketing actually existed, or at worst, another failed venture of the Jeff Pulvino/Shane Barker dynamic duo posing as another fake client. From the company’s physical address to their promotional materials, everything points back to US Loan Auditors, the fraudulent venture which shut down its doors in 2010. Either way, what little work could possibly be claimed is unfinished, making it a poor yet accurate example of Creatine Marketing's work.
Creatine Marketing's Service Claims
Creatine Marketing Client Page Capture 9/10/13
Client Description
ROADvertise came to us with a concept. They want to buy a mobile marketing truck and start
marketing local business in Sacramento. They didn’t have a name, a logo, business cards or anything.
It was an idea to implementation type project.
Who is ROADvertise?
We provide outdoor media advertising services through the use of our billboard trucks. Please provide
your information and we will get in touch with you.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) – When you Google “Roadvertise”, we were able to secure #1,
#2 and #4 spots on the first page
Shadiness Factors
ROADvertise's work is dated early 2010, almost a full year before Creatine Marketing was founded, and while US Loan Auditors was still in business.
ROADvertise's website and listings show a mailing address identical to US Loan Auditors in their Rancho Cordova location.
ROADvertise’s video work on Vimeo exclusively showcases advertising for US Loan Auditors.
ROADvertise’s website is only dummy text, and US Loan Auditors advertisements with no real content. The site was never finished.
Securing top listings for a business name is not successful SEO. Good SEO is about achieving high ranking in commonly searched terms, for people that don't know what they are searching for, not people searching for a specific business by name.
Poor SEO rankings for simple common search terms
Sacramento mobile advertising
Sacramento mobile billboards
Sacramento mobile billboard trucks
Sacramento truck advertising
Mobile truck billboards Sacramento
Powered by Creatine Marketing
Website built is actually customizable Wordpress theme called “Road Advertisements” from ViwoThemes.
We admit that it is possible that the business arrangement between Creatine Marketing and this company may have changed or not be fully expressed as we have shown here. If we have incorrect information or you wish to clarify the information posted here, please feel free to contact us with the necessary information.
This certainly has been a big week for the United States LGBT community. I can't begin to count how much productivity I've lost captivated with following the landmark SCOTUS Prop 8 and DOMA rulings. Same-sex marriage is once again legal in California, and Sacramento alone issued 19 same-sex marriage licenses today alone, and even Modern Family is taking a look at getting hitched in the post DOMA cheer. Now there are many better educated discussions on the topic, and I have no intention trying to duplicate that evaluation and commentary, but I do have a point to make, and though it is probably not the more important points of the topic, I think it is interesting nonetheless. What I want to discuss isn't about looking forward at what the future will hold, but looking back at what was done along the way. The question is what does Creatine Marketing have to do with this? The answer is prop8.org.
As we all know in 2008, the California public brought proposition 8 to voter ballot, and was likely the most controversial issue on the ballot at the time. As with today, debate raged, and phrases like 'prop 8' were trending, and who came along to take advantage of that? None other than our friends at Creatine Marketing. Back in 2008, Jeff Pulvino and Shane Barker were running a US Loan Auditors precursor real estate scam called, Prop8 Associates, complete with their all too familiar affiliate marketing option.
Of course no one believes that this founded-during-California-Prop-8-campaign company just happened to share the same name as one of the most popular search terms of the time. The Pulvino/Barker dynamic duo were trying to cash in on the buzz with misleading marketing tactics. At the same time, I suppose you can't really fault this type of tactic if it worked, but it just seems in poor taste to take advantage of the issue.
Now we've mentioned before a number of businesses run by the Pulvino/Barker duo, including this blog's namesake, Creatine Marketing, and like most of these businesses, Prop8 Associates LLC is no more. Why then is the domain prop8.org now registered to Creatine Marketing (aka Next Level Ideas)?
It would appear that Creatine Marketing is still tying to make a profit on the gay rights debate. For the last several years, this domain has been used as a parking page with an offer to sell to the highest bidder. Using parked domains to make money is nothing new. What I question is why this was kept all this time, and the content currently on the site. Prop8.org now contains a very basic Wordpress site stating its would be value, a starting bidding price of $75,000, many middle of the road blog articles on gay equal rights topics, and a boast of a #3 rank on Google.
I find this despicable. This is not an abandoned and forgotten domain, it was actively renewed not 3 months ago listing Creatine Marketing's less than one year old address at 3840 Rosin Court according to their WHOIS registration. This is an intentional attempt to profit on an issue of targeted discrimination against millions of Californians, and just one more example of what these con artists are willing to do to make a few bucks. This is what makes a con artist. No morals, and the active sense and willingness to exploit the trends of the time, whether it be desperate home-owners, the social media marketing craze, or even the pain the LGBT community.
Jeff Pulvino is a self described serial entrepreneur best known for his involvement in the high profile scandal in which Pulvino's failed company, US Loan Auditors, and its partner company My US Legal declared bankruptcy after a multimillion dollar lawsuit and stealing from thousands of homeowners using deceptive marketing tactics.
Though cited as a client, he is, in fact, actually one of the principal owners of Creatine Marketing with both an office on premises, and acting as a sales consultant. While officially un-cited on the staff page, it's not difficult to find his ties to the company. Jeff is also in a long-term relationship with other Creatine Marketing co-owner, Jennifer Carr-Mount.
Any work by Creatine Marketing is actually self investment as Jeff's primary focus is promoting Creatine Marketing.
Creatine Marketing's Service Claims
Client Description
Creatine Marketing Client Page Capture 6/01/13
Jeff Pulvino came to us looking to expand his brand name, Jeff Pulvino. He was a successful entrepreneur, consultant and marketing expert.
Who is Jeff Pulvino?
Jeff Pulvino is a successful serial entrepreneur with the ability to develop visionary ‘next-level’ ideas and deliver them to marketplace while meeting the end-user needs with precision timing. Jeff has a solid background of product development and marketplace knowledge, developed around strategic observations and business intelligence. He is experienced with all aspects of operations specializing in sales, marketing, project management, organizational process development, and infrastructure expansion, all geared towards driving growth and increased revenues for higher profitability.
In his professional career Jeff has been involved with several successful start-up business ventures, most of which he co-founded. He brings real-life knowledge and experience in offering proven and tested strategies and solutions for taking your business to the next level.
Jeff Pulvino is actually an unlisted owner of Creatine Marketing listed as a client for his personal endorsement
Jeff claims he is a successful entrepreneur, but has no successful businesses to his name. The most well known company, USLA, is known mostly for its high profile failure
Articles written by Jeff Pulvino are actually copy-written articles by Creatine Marketing staff writers. Jeff has no formal training in marketing, or social media.
Despite the logo design service listed, none of Jeff's online profiles or his personal website show a logo
Jeff Pulvino has a permanent injunction against him, barring him from business in the real estate industry for deceptive marketing tactics, and owes $15,000 in civil penalties over the next 3 years
Jeff Pulvino is listed as successfully cofounding many businesses when he really moves from scam business to scam business every couple years including:
currently founding member of Creatine Marketing, unlisted
previously co-founded "property tax reduction" service called Prop 8 Associates with Shane Barker
previously cofounded US Loan Auditors, famous for its high profile government shutdown, with Shane Barker
previously founded US Capital Investments, US Loan Auditors parent company
previously founded My US Legal Services, US Loan Auditors Legal division, along with Shane Barker and James Sandison
previously founded Cashout Options, with Shane Barker
Social Media Activity
Most of Jeff's online activity points back towards Creatine Marketing. Though apparently the most popular of Creatine Marketing's online personas, Jeff's profiles have very little social engagement and include automated spam and posts shared with most of the company's other profiles.
Most of the 100s of social media profiles, other than the top 10, have little to no active content and constitute online spam.
Powered by Creatine Marketing
Website built is actually customizable Wordpress theme named Temptation, available for $35 at Themeforest.
We admit that it is possible that the business arrangement between Creatine Marketing and this company may have changed or not be fully expressed as we have shown here. If we have incorrect information or you wish to clarify the information posted here, please feel free to contact us with the necessary information.
Keep It Clean America is a Sacramento based cleaning company with an extremely poor online reputation including terrible reviews on Yelp mostly related to customers attempting to schedule schedule appointments repeatedly with them, ending up being no-shows and were unresponsive to calls and e-mails, and unhonored GroupOn purchases.
Creatine Marketing's Service Claims
Client Description
Creatine Marketing Client Page Capture 6/01/13
With over 10 years of professional cleaning experience, Keep It Clean uses the latest cleaning systems
for a deep clean that no other cleaner can compete with. Voted best in price, service, and professionalism, Keep It Clean has a 100% satisfaction guarantee in their carpet, upholstery, tile and grout, and duct cleaning services.
Jennifer, Robert, Daniel, and Nicolas, all upper-level executives and owners of Creatine Marketing wrote 4 or 5 star reviews on Keep It Clean’s behalf, violating Yelp’s terms of services.
The client page for Keep It Clean was created on December 25, 2012 at the same time that the fake positive reviews by Creatine Marketing’s owners were posted
Google lists Penis Enlargement page on Keep It Clean's website
Poor SEO rankings for simple common search terms
Roseville Carpet Cleaning
Sacramento Cleaning Services
Sacramento Cleaning Service
Roseville Stain Removal
Social Media Activity
All social media profiles have been inactive for months
Powered by Creatine Marketing
Website built is actually customizable Wordpress theme named Nebraska, available for $45 at Themeforest.
We admit that it is possible that the business arrangement between Creatine Marketing and this company may have changed or not be fully expressed as we have shown here. If we have incorrect information or you wish to clarify the information posted here, please feel free to contact us with the necessary information.
One of the Most Suspicious Marketing Firms Sacramento Has Ever
Seen
Scam artists tend to capitalize on emerging trends,
adjusting their strategy according to shifts in consumer activity. Creatine
Marketing claims to be one of the best marketing
firms Sacramentohas to offer. On
the surface, they offer web design and
marketing servicesbut internally they are a multilevel marketing scheme driven by their efforts in Visalus,
Organo Gold, X-treme Biz, and Solavei. Flashback to 2010 a well-known and
sizable company by the name of "US Loan Auditors" was brought to
their knees when they were slapped with a $60 million lawsuit by the California
Attorney General Jerry Brown, a class action lawsuit, and a lawsuit from Bank
of America. The key players named in the lawsuit were Jeff Pulvino, Shane
Barker, and James Sandison. Their crime? Falsely claiming they could help
troubled homeowners faced with foreclosure and the housing crisis, by going after
the lending scam artists who
provided them with bad loans. They claimed to be experts on predatory lendingand preyed on
desperate homeowners with little to no means of escaping foreclosure.
The outcome? As indicated by the official court documents,
civil lawsuits, nationwide news reports (here and here),
testimonials from various victims on Privatecomplaints.com, Ripoffreport.com,
and Complaintsboard.com,
and complaints filed with the Better Business Bureau, US Loan Auditors would overcharge on
a loan audit report, and tell the desperate homeowners they had a case against
their lending scam artists, keep
charging the victims a monthly rate of $1500. Either it would take them months
to actually submit paperwork to the court, or they simply wouldn't return
voicemails or acknowledge clients' requests to cancel payments.
CBS Local's "Call Kurtis Investigates" did a TV investigation on US Loan Auditors here:
According to the official court document, Jeff Pulvino was not an attorney or an authorized real
estate salesman, thus he wasn't in any legal capacity to be able to offer
professional advice on homeowners' mortgage or loans. Furthermore he was denied
his license by the certification board due to his criminal record including
multiple DUIs, driving on a suspended license, and attempted grand theft.
James was an attorney who had strikes on his record from
previous infringements, and became officially disbarred in 2011.
"Sandison stipulated to disbarment, admitting he
misappropriated more than $68,000 from Comcast and another $56,388 from a
client, and by allowing a resigned lawyer to use his name and client trust
account while holding himself out as as attorney.
He opened trust and business accounts without his partner’s
knowledge, misused those accounts, and did not maintain a proper balance.
Although he paid out some funds to Comcast, he misappropriated $68,332.07. He
did repay $33,000 of that amount. He also misappropriated $56,388.82 in legal
fees to which his partner was entitled."
One of the
Questionable Marketing Firms Sacramento
Should Be Cautious Of?
Now, this brings us to the present day in 2013. The
same individual gentlemen named in the lawsuit Jeff Pulvino, Shane Barker, and
James Sandison started another social media marketing company named Creatine
Marketing located in 3840 Rosin Ct, Sacramento, CA. Their
company is driven by profits from multi
level marketing scams that each of the owners participate in.
Shane Barker, now a former chief Marketing Officer of
Creatine Marketing now runs his own marketing company, Modera. Jennifer Mount,
former Executive Assistant at US Loan Auditors now works as a co-founder of
Creatine Marketing. Daniel Fleetwood, former Vice President of Sales at US Loan
Auditors, now also operates as a co-founder of Creatine Marketing.
Now why is this relevant? Let me reference former US Loan
Auditors accountant, Paula Sontra's legal affidavit from back in October, 2010
“I was also told by Pulvino that he, Barker,
and Sandison are planning to start several new companies, and that they are planning to hide any association between these
new companies and their individual names because of their "bad
credit history," and especially Sandison's name because
of the bar issues," by which I assume he meant the disciplinary
charges for embezzlement and other misconduct that the State Bar recently
filed against Sandison.
I was told by Pulvino they would like to form
these new companies quickly and that
they will be Nevada corporations. I was also told that they would prefer to
establish each one as a separate entity because if legal issues arise with
one or more of them, the others could be
kept going. Pulvino told me that they may obtain a separate
office space for each company, preferably different suites in the same
building.”
Sure enough, flash forward to 2013, Jeff Pulvino is a co-founder of CreatineMarketing, without any public acknowledgment on the website's team page, and Shane
Barker and Jeff Pulvino are publicly listed as reputation management
"clients". The company's business license is a Nevada business license under the name of Next
Level Ideas, Inc and listed under Daniel Fleetwood, former Vice President of
Sales at US Loan Auditors.
Who is Creatine Marketing? feat. Nicolas Fordham & James Sandison
James Sandison, a now disbarred attorney, works in the
"legal department" at Creatine Marketing. His name is also nowhere on
the company's website. The company (as shown in the second video) are preparing
to use two separate office spaces in the same building at 3840 Rosin
Court. The man shown in the video Nicolas Fordham, runs MXSWeb.com and X-treme Biz, MXSWeb's
affiliate marketing program.
Creatine Marketing is now housing members of Organo Gold,
Visalus, and X-treme Biz, all affiliate marketing schemes with questionable
business practices. Jeff Pulvino, Daniel Fleetwood, Robert Black, and Patrick
A. Weller all operate parts of Organo Gold whilst working under Creatine
Marketing. Interesting enough, Organo Gold had claims filed against them by the
Federal Trade Commission for its false health claims. http://www.krgv.com/news/special-investigation-organo-gold-federal-investigations/
Creatine Marketing's domain name was set up in October 1st,
2010, around the same time the owners of US Loan Auditors were publicly
handling their lawsuit and subsequent bankruptcy, so as Paula Sontra officially
stated, Jeff Pulvino made the immediate move to establish Creatine Marketing
after the downfall of US Loan Auditors:
Created on: 01-Oct-10
Expires on: 01-Oct-13
Last Updated on: 15-Jan-13
Registrant:
Next Level Ideas"
They advertise for sales rep positions on Craigslist:
"Creatine Marketing is looking to hire experienced and
aggressive B2B sales representatives IMMEDIATELY! No direct marketing experience
is necessary.
Real Estate, Loan Officer, Mortgage, Car Sales, Computer Sales, and any
B2B Sales experience is all preferred."
Now given the business owners' history with US Loan Auditors
it seems suspicious that candidates with real estate experience would
be preferred for one of the supposed best social marketing
companies with no real public ties to the real estate industry. What would the
"leading experts in social media marketing" want to do with former
real estate salesmen?
SNAP Social and X-Treme Biz:
Just Another Multilevel Marketing Scheme
SNAP Social is a
social media aggregate platform that Creatine Marketing supposedly developed
with the help of professionals in India, and one that they plan to sell via a multilevel marketing
scheme. The truth? While the owners and sales reps at Creatine
Marketing falsely tell people that they developed their own
"original" platform, the third party tool actually comes as a courtesy
of Sendible. For $99 a month, Sendible
allows businesses to white label the tool and re-brand it for the purpose of
reselling it to clients.
SNAP Social and X-Treme Biz original presentation
SNAP Social and X-Treme Biz Platform
Sendible: Look Familiar?
Other shady business practices Creatine Marketing employs?
Creatine Marketing uses unlicensed Microsoft and Adobe software on their
company computers such as the Windows operating systems and the Adobe Creative
Suite.
Although the industry that these individuals
have shifted to is different, the tricks are the same. Jeff Pulvino,
Daniel Fleetwood, Jennifer Carr Mount, and James Sandison, all former employees
of US Loan Auditors, now work under the same roof again under the guise of
Creatine Marketing. If they manage to fool you with their smoke and
mirrors, then they truly are "experts" at reputation management.
