CogBlog

This event passed by with no-one even noticing. Looksmart has finally paid it's debt to it's long-time customers and will be ending it's free-click program.

If you were around oh-so-long-ago when Looksmart changed it's business model from a one-time $300 listing fee per business, to a PPC model, you might remember the fury they unleashed. Webmasters the world over were steaming mad. How could you charge us for clicks! We paid our $300, that entitles us to free clicks forever!

Looksmart was sued, and as part of the settlement had to pay off all those old customers with a click-credit, equal to the amount of their original listing price. But, they did it at $15/month for 20 months.

We had 19 Looksmart listings, so we've been collecting our $285 in free Looksmart clicks for the last almost two years. It all ended yesterday.

Looksmart probably needs some good news right about now. They lost Microsoft at the end of last year -- their biggest customer by a huge margin. The stock is in the toilet.

All this could have been avoided (maybe not the loss of Microsoft, but the refund hassle) if someone early on would have questioned the wisdom of charging only $300 for a lifetime of service. But, at least they had the guts to make the change, no matter how painful.

Good luck Looksmart.