Promotion campaign practices

[palmar]

To whom it may concern:

I must really say that in the meantime I am cloyed by the promotion practices your company uses to sell its product. You flood other forums, whether competitor's or independant, with your beta tester agents, and let them tell phrases like "ours is better than theirs", "it's easy to use", "thank you Airnav", "I can power it through USB" and all that childish nonsense. You picture innocent male models on your website with names of people who do not even exist. Your beta testers constantly tell about rain hindering the reception. And so on...

You aim to sell a product that costs a monthly wage for some people, but your promotion campaign is directed to a market that's looking for cheap chewing gum. This does not create trust to me as a potential buyer. By the way your representatives at this forum do not even carry personal names.

I am not representing anybody else here and I am not KineticDavid, but a potential buyer, and this is my personal impression, and after all this yelling and shouting the hurdle for your product to be technically acceptable (in a very very difficult avionics rf environment) becomes higher every day.

palmar

[tarbat]

You picture innocent male models on your website with names of people who do not even exist.

They even use names of people who have emailed them - my name appeared against a comment stating "Every morning I'm able to track the flights from the US and Canada to Europe. With my scanner turned on it's a real air traffic control tower."

It can't be coincidence that they've used my name after I've emailed them a couple of times.  False advertising in my opinion.

[Allocator]

You picture innocent male models on your website with names of people who do not even exist.

They even use names of people who have emailed them - my name appeared against a comment stating "Every morning I'm able to track the flights from the US and Canada to Europe. With my scanner turned on it's a real air traffic control tower."

It can't be coincidence that they've used my name after I've emailed them a couple of times.  False advertising in my opinion.

I thought that you were based in Scotland - must be somebody else with the same name?

[tarbat]

I thought that you were based in Scotland - must be somebody else with the same name?

Yes, I'm in Scotland.  But what's the chances of them picking exactly the same name for one of their "customer quotes" as someone who very recently contacted them by email with that name!!  These "customer quotes" look like made-up quotes to me - even the photo assigned to each "person" changes!!

As palmar said, this type of advertising only serves to reduce a potential buyer's confidence and trust in AirNav the company.

[DaveG]

The quote on their site with the wording you state above is from a Christopher Gray, Dublin, Ireland

"Every morning I'm able to track the flights from the US and Canada to Europe. With my scanner turned on it's a real air traffic control tower.
Christopher Gray, Dublin, Ireland"

Also the images are clearly website stock images and nothing to do with the quotes!

[AirNav Support]

Hi Palmar & all,

Firstly our beta testers have not flooded any forum. If they have please email us the link and we will talk directly with the beta tester. The testers were not allowed to mention the product due to NDAs during the development phase, once this was lifted they were allowed to say anything (they were not all employees of AirNav Systems). We did not give them specific instructions to spread the word. No AirNav Systems employee is allowed to speak on behalf of the company on forums unless stated.

"You picture innocent male models on your website with names of people who do not even exist. " The names are real and are of beta testers of the product, they did not want the there pictures displayed and we felt this was the best way. We are not suggesting that the person in the picture said that quote, its just a graphical way of putting through a message.

"You aim to sell a product that costs a monthly wage for some people, but your promotion campaign is directed to a market that's looking for cheap chewing gum."
We are quite shocked by this and if this what a majority of potential customers feel then we will change it , can you send us a email or post on the forum on what you think is appropriate?

"This does not create trust to me as a potential buyer. By the way your representatives at this forum do not even carry personal names."
This is done because we have a large number of employees during different shifts and hence its easier to keep one email or account to handle any queries. Having said that we will take on your view.

"Your beta testers constantly tell about rain hindering the reception."
This misinformation. A beta tester mentioned it as he thought that radio waves are affected in rain and its spread around different forums.

At present due to the limited amount of users of RadarBox there has been a lot of misinformation been passed around also a lot of excitement on forums regarding the product which has led to good and bad press. Anything said by any beta tester is instantly and understandably magnified.

However we expect once the product is out there, that the customers will speak for themselves.

I hope that answers your question. Lastly we are here to provide a product for the customer and listen to the customer ideas and issues, so we are all ears.

[tarbat]

The names are real and are of beta testers of the product

That's an even bigger coincidence then.  You have a quote from a beta tester named Christopher Gray, and it seems an amazing coincidence that you have a beta tester with the same name as me, since I emailed AirNav and Akbar Sherwani enquiring about the product before launch.

Can you really state that Christopher Gray was a beta tester? 

[AirNav Support]

Hi Tarbat,

Yes we did have a beta tester called Christopher Gray. The website was produced before the prerelease and announcements, so it must be a coincidence. The name you is mention is not rare so its possible :)

As you can see from some of the screenhots on our site he was picking up aircraft in Ireland.

[ATCManch]

Just as an add on to this debate, I sent a message on another thread about databases being a year and a half out of date for one of their other products and asked would this happen with RadarBox. Because I mentioned the other products name they said it was irrelevent and deleted the message.

They definatly don't like any bad comments about their stuff, which is a shame as I want honest opions about something this expensive before I buy.

It has put me off it a bit

[AirNav Support]

Hi ATCManch,

Your post regarding the databases was discussed fully in your topic. One of your posts however had nothing to do with RadarBox and hence was deleted (as it was against the rules). We did answer your main question as you can see for yourself.

You can freely discuss RadarBox on these forums within reasons however as mentioned your comment was not based on RadarBox and hence was deleted.

I hope that helps.

[Brian]

Read two posts above!
Even that user has said the AirNavSystems RadarBox database server is out of date and sending misinformation! and this was back in year 2007! 

and nothing been done about it yet.

Still waiting AirNavSystem staff.....

[Brian]

wow good find.  Always funny how companies just pick names when the product hasn't been fully release.

AirNavSystem could be a good product.  I just wish they would open the database up and have a web interface that can pull database request.
It shouldn't be that hard to do!  Other websites does it with a large database.

but the past week after working on the RadarBox user database filling in information from missing empty boxes on each aircraft entry. 

I been rethinking and should have went with Kinetic Avionic Product "SBS-1" unit.  Since it doesn't have this problem and could deal with it better.

[tarbat]

I been rethinking and should have went with Kinetic Avionic Product "SBS-1" unit.  Since it doesn't have this problem and could deal with it better.

Well, to achieve the same as the SBS-1, just turn off autopopulating in Radarbox!!

[Brian]

but that doesn't help the new user. 

You would just be updating your own database.
The information needs to be updated on the AirNavSystem RadarBox database so all user of RadarBox can use the newer information.

As a RadarBox user group.  We need to get all the same information across to all users.   So it can benefit any new RadarBox user in that area...

Something needs to done! and not wait for 5 years to past!

Or AirNavSystem could lose RadarBox sales to the other product (Kinetic Avionic Product "SBS-1") or whatever new product that comes out in the feature.
Maybe Microsoft will come out with one ;)

[AirNav Support]

Locking thread as same information is being posted on other threads, Please stick to one thread. Thanks.