Is Matterport a Franchise????? Are they Registered?9641
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Here is a question that may interest a few people. Is Matterport a Franchise. Do they do all the things a Franchise does? If so are they supposed to register? Is the "Matterport Service Partner" program a business opportunity? | ||
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Regina, Saskatchewan Canada |
Queen_City_3D private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I don't see how Matterport's business structure is anything like a franchise. They did do a pilot project where they were taking job orders themselves and hiring out the work to camera operators for a very small amount, but I think they stopped that when they got all the push back. Personally I like the MSP program. Obviously its a crap-shoot if you get any leads and whether or not those are any good, but I think in the last 4 years we've had maybe 6 jobs that came from that. Not a lot, but that's money we otherwise wouldn't have had. |
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 WGAN StandardMember Las Vegas |
VTLV private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Changesin3d - You sent me down a hole. I shook my head at the title and then thought back to a GeorgeK video referring to the Federal Trade Commission. So I look up what Constitutes a Franchise? I took the bait and read on to piece about "Franchising Is also a Contractual Relationship" "Franchising is a contractual relationship between a licencor (franchisor) and a licensee (franchisee) that allows the business owner to use the licensor’s brand and method of doing business to distribute products or services to consumers. While every franchise is a license, not every license is a franchise under the law. Sometimes that can be very confusing." Some Bullet points show: • The franchisor licenses a franchisee the right to use its trade or service mark; • To identify the franchisee’s business in marketing a product or service using the franchisor’s operating methods; • The franchisor provides the franchisee with support and exercises certain controls; and, • The franchisee pays the franchisor a fee. I recall Matterport making some demands that do not include the Matterport logo into our own business Logos or sole logo branding. This could be a tipping point at which they could be operating as a Franchise company while hiding behind the Online Tech/Data company so many tech giants do when legal gets brought up. |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Well it looks like they do all the things a franchise does. They call you a "Partner" and let you use their logo. They have a totally closed system, their camera, their processing, their hosting. They limit the use of the camera. They charge you for the OBJ file. They charge a monthly fee to stay involved even if you do not use the system. They can discontinue service at any time for any reason, forcing you to erase all data. (look at the terms of use. Section 9 "termination." They can modify the agreement any time they want. They hold license to the scans, and can change the use of their license any time they want. They provide leads. The MSP Program identifies your location for the leads. I am leaning to if it looks like a duck... just saying.. what say you? |
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 WGAN FanClub Member Queensland, Australia |
Wingman private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by Queen_City_3D There was a big topic on MOUG Facebook page a few days ago where MSPs(about 20 or even more MSPs participated) shared how many leads they received from MSP network. I do not recall anyone saying they have got any actual orders for scanning from it. Some received some enquiries though, there was one with 11 or close over 2-3 years. None of them turn into orders as all clients submitting them suddenly disappeared after the first contact. Also there was one post saying that Matterport even caught one of their employees generating these fake enquiries directly from a Matterport PC. Not sure if it is a true story as I cannot see any reason why Matterport employee would be doing something like this without Matterport being involved. You are actually the first MSP who has confirmed that he got 6 actual jobs. Good on you. I have never seen any for more than a year. However I am in Australia and I guess it can make a difference. |
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Regina, Saskatchewan Canada |
Queen_City_3D private msg quote post Address this user | |
| To be fair, it was 6 jobs out of 3 leads that panned out (one was a one-off, the other we've done 2 jobs for so far and will have a 3rd coming up, and the other we've done 3 jobs for). There's been maybe 4 or 5 other leads that came in that didn't pan out at all. | ||
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San Francisco |
Jwbuckl private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Matterport does not sell franchise licenses. Thus far, franchise has not been our business model. Also please refer to section one of the MSP Terms of Service where it stipulates the relationship between Matterport and MSP. It can be found here: clickable text |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Really are you doing all the things that a Franchise does but do not want to be a franchise? How about the Business Opportunity rules of the FTC and the 20 some odd States that have similar laws? You may want to read the ads you do. Should the ads not agree with the law. Have you talked to your legal team about this or is this just your opinion? I suggest you do like I did open Black Law Dictionary and read Partner in Estopple. What are you doing to rewrite the MSP Program? Are you saying you are not a Bus Op or Franchise because you have to give out disclosures for those and you have not been doing it? |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Matterport calls the MSP Program free on the link provided by JWBuckl... "The Program is a free program managed by Matterport," but you must have one of their cameras with is thousands of dollars... if it is free you would not need a camera. Matterport for months has been saying they are redoing the MSP Program and are silent when questioned about it. (my opinion) Why is that? |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Jwbuckl I dug a little deeper as of course everyone wants to TRUST but Verify, I went to the FTC video that was mentioned in another video. At the 1 min 13 second mark the Attorney makes this real interesting saying if you state you will provide Leads / Customers you are a bus op. Maybe you could provide us with a link to the FTC Required Bus Op disclosure, surely you have one right? If you have not seen the video let me give you the link. Of course this is not some "talking head critic" this is the FTC. Tell us how are you improving the MSP Program where are the filtered leads that were promised? What are the upcoming changes? @LVLV thanks for sharing this info "You sent me down a hole. I shook my head at the title and then thought back to a GeorgeK video referring to the Federal Trade Commission." |
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San Francisco |
Jwbuckl private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Changesin3d I am neither an attorney nor have I viewed the video, but I know the company has gone to great lengths to make all required disclosures and warranties in the MSP TOS. Should you have questions in this area, consulting your business attorney for clarification may be the best course of action. The MSP program is free to join, not required to offer Matterport as a service and comes with all necessary program details including Terms of Service on www.matterport.com There have been many great recommendations for improving the current MSP program, many of them discussed here on the Forum in other threads, that require careful consideration and consult with our MSP Ambassadors. Our executives promised to listen. We have much work to do before there is anything to announce. To get to the scale we know we can grow to as a community on the way to 100m scans, the current process and infrastructure are not optimal. I believe we all agree on that. |
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3D_Hoffa private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Jwbuckl who are the MSP Ambassadors? Who selected them? Was there a vote or were they hand picked? If they were voted on, then I must have missed it. If they were hand picked, why do I not get a say in who represents me? That's great that the executives will "listen", but are they going to do anything? We have been bringing up the same issues for a looooong time now with no action. So what is different now? RJ Pittman? LOL. I guess he'll listen to us like he listed to the eBay users right? Yes, we can all agree the process and infrastructure is not "optimal". But the ball is in your court and has been for quite some time. You are just stalling until things calm down. |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @jwbuckl to some people it is hard to be polite and still make the point effectively. It seems you would invest the time to watch the video and be able to speak to the issue with some authority. Maybe you could explain to me why every MSP would not reach out to the FTC and inquire about the need for the disclosure. @3D_Hoffa I agree with you. Do you figure that there is a simple inquiry - complaint being drafted to the FTC that can be posted here, in WGA, so we can all ask them? It appears this does not interest Matterport enough to even answer simple questions. Like jwbuckl I am not an attorney but these appear to be easy to answer questions they are either a bus op or then are not. If they are they need the disclosure. |
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Regina, Saskatchewan Canada |
Queen_City_3D private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Sorry guys, but I fail to see the hang up over the MSP program as it’s free to join. I can see the outrage if you pay for good leads and don’t get any or many, but I don’t see the point of complaining about something that doesn’t cost anything. I’ve been an early Matterport adopter and have received maybe 6 or 7 MSP leads. Of those, 3 turned into jobs and 2 of them turned into multiple jobs (nothing major... 1 additional for one of them with another upcoming, and 2 additional for the other for a grand total of 6 gigs to date with perhaps a few more to come). The way I see it, those were nice bonuses that came our way. Certainly not enough to sustain a business on, but a few jobs we may not have otherwise received. I think it’s important to bear in mind that if each of us are doing a good job of putting our individual companies out there, then the customer should be reaching out to us straight away and not to Matterport, so the top Companies would tend to get less Matterport leads as they would get those customers through their own merits. I think any outrage on this issue can be saved for other concerns (like if grandfathered plans were to go away). |
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Changesin3d private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Queen_City_3D I respect your opinion however "Free" is a misnomer, you have to buy the camera, it is not free! Currently you can not be a MSP without buying their Camera... Ricoh Z1 and the others do not quality. (correct me if I am wrong @jwbuckl ) The "filtered leads" are / were a sales virtue, tied to the purchase of the expensive propriety camera. If someone sold you a 100 horse power snowmobile for the Great White North and you found out it was "50" horse power you would be some what upset right? We are entitled to all that is promised, correct? That is just one of the frustrations of the MSP, and even Matterport seems to be saying they are going to change the system because so many people are upset. Tell me is there a business opportunity rule in Canada? The FTC Rule seems to be pretty clear did you even watch the FTC video? Or are you like @jwbuckl voicing an opinion without even watching the FTC video? |
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3D_Hoffa private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @Queen_City_3D It's great that you are doing fine with all this. I wish I felt the same. I think you have to look at the big picture here though. You are doing fine right now but what about in 3 months? 6 months? A year from now? And it's not all about pricing, or free leads or whatever you want to insert here. This company has already demonstrated the will to change whatever they want, whenever they want, to suite their needs. If we don't take some sort of stand now, they will simply screw us all later. They have already attempted this! I've never personally dealt with a company that acts this way and it's infuriating! They seem to show a complete disregard for their "partners". I'm not sure how to help you see. You have to look at their past actions. Read through the transcript from the fireside chat and see all the avoidance on important issues like copyright and who owns the content. Read the tech crunch article where they want to position themselves as a Getty for 3D. It seems so clear to me. I do hope you are right. I hope we are over reacting. But my gut says NO. We need to protect ourselves. Take the blinders off. |
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| Post 16 • IP flag post | ||
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Regina, Saskatchewan Canada |
Queen_City_3D private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I still fail to see the fuss. If someone is searching for a Matterport provider and reaches out to Matterport, then Matterport sends the lead to a local MSP. And if there's several MSPs then there's probably some rule they use to decide who gets the opportunity (not sure what process they follow for that). In the initial days of Matterport, this was likely more common for leads to go to Matterport. Now; however, if we are all advertising our businesses effectively, then the customers should be able to find us direct. Don't get me wrong... I don't think Matterport's business plan is perfect in every respect... I just don't think the MSP program is core to the purchase of the camera and the hosting plans. It's always been a side thing that *might* pay off for you if you're lucky. Heck, I've probably made less than $2,000 off all the gigs we've closed through that program since 2015, which certainly doesn't come anywhere near covering the cost of the initial Pro1 we purchased, followed by the Pro2 purchase when the new camera came out. I was never relying on Matterport supplied leads to survive though, so it's always been bonus jobs in my mind. I just opened up an incognito web browser and typed "Matterport [My Town]". The top search link was matterport itself, and the next 2 were our website. I would hazard to guess that most customers would see that we were the local option and would contact us directly rather than filling out a form with a company based in Sunnyvale, California. I have a lot more issues with Matterport with their new hosting plans which I think are utter B.S. That said, I'm fine with them as long as I'm grandfathered in, as I have built my business model on the classic plans. If/When Matterport thinks they should do away with those classic plans, THEN you will see me raise a tremendous fuss (as I would probably give up Matterport offerings altogether at that point). Until then though... it's business as usual. |
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