Thanks to reader and researcher Doo Dilly, who agreed to be the guinea pig for testing a BlastOff Network e-mail invitation. I logged into my network (which gave me a 10% BlastOff status for some reason) and saw the following options:
Option 3: Printed Invite
I did not test this, but find it quite silly that they give a prevalent option of printing invite cards. The service is offered through VistaPrint, which may or may not give you cash back for ordering!
Option 2: Facebook Invite
Another prevalent invite option displays a popover that uses Facebook’s standard link sharer code to let you quickly annoy your social network. Alas I did not test this either, because I don’t want to spam even my “Facebook friends”.
Option 1: E-mail Invite
My favorite part is the “exclusive” feel they give by limiting you to 250 invites. I clicked the Manual Entry option with launched the following popover:
I sent the invite to Doo Dilly and got this summary:
My BlastOff status is now 30% complete after sending the invite. I will wait for Doo Dilly’s response and then post the results.
UPDATE 12/01/09: The resulting network.
Strange prices for cards, since after a cursory look at the prices at VistaPrint, it appears BO will be making some $ off of the cards. (Oh, mon dieu!)
Cards appear to cost $4-14/250, and $6-26 to ship. The front page offers free shipping, but who knows??? (I’ll bet the inflated BO price of $20 does not include shipping, if there is a fee–and the cards already exist in VP’s software)
http://www.vistaprint.com/business-cards.aspx?xnav=pricingdetails
http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/welcome.aspx?xnav=welcomeback&rd=2
This is an old post, but VP does not appear to be a vendor:
http://getsatisfaction.com/blastoff/topics/vista_printing
There are, however other printing vendors in the mall, but I didn’t have the patience to check prices.
As to your % status, well, to paraphrase from the Hindenburg disaster: “Oh, the inanity:
http://getsatisfaction.com/blastoff/topics/status_incomplete
http://getsatisfaction.com/blastoff/topics/status_change-k3d4
Meanwhile, I received and replied to your private e-mail, but as of now, I have yet to receive my official e-vite. Maybe the Internet is closed on the eve of Thanksgiving… we shall see…
Since I had to join under you to get into the new private community, I sent some test e-mails out from my site:
Comcast: Force field/shield
Yahoo: Spam folder
Hotmail: Spam folder
gmail: Spam folder
Since they’re paying for Jango already, and BO has been up and misfiring for over a month, you’d think they would have done something to correct this, since more members may invite more potential members, which means more potential $ for BO.
Bungling Bush-League Bozos.