Signals United Inc / Signals United / Smart Circle (brother scam company) / Smart Circle International Empty office, full day second interview kidnapping (without breaking laws technically), no background information whatsoever Orange California

Fresh out of college, I was ready to dive into the world of marketing. I see the online advertisement, Marketing & Advertising Entry Level, and that "We are interested in developing quality candidates through all facets of what we do for our clients. This involves all entry level aspects of promotional sales, marketing, customer service and public relations work we do for our clients. We are looking to rapidly coach individuals towards a role overseeing multiple accounts and individuals." This obviously sounds too good to be true, and I wish I hadn't noticed all the problems so late, but oh well we learn.

Looking back on it now, I see that not only do they have listings for Orange, but they have listings for Santa Ana, Anaheim, Buena Park, Garden Grove, and all other nearby neighborhoods, with each posting beginning with a different sentence so as to not throw people off. At one point I almost accidentally applied for them twice, but they are not only on every single job searching website, but they have about 13 postings on each.

I tried researching the website before deciding on applying, however there was nothing to be found. No Glassdoor report, no news articles, no reviews, absolutely nothing. Just their website, feeding me all the wonderful lies of how they work with Fortune 500 companies and their team "expands rapidly" as I had heard about 100 times throughout this experience.

Literally an hour after I had applied I received a call from them. I spoke to a woman named "Alex" who wanted to interview me. She told me that her supervisor, not her, had actually been the one to find my resume and they wanted to see me "as soon as possible." According to her, "We just finished up our round of interviews next week, but if you can come in tomorrow as soon as possible we will be able to squeeze you in." Thanks for the ego boost, like an idiot i had really believed I was the lucky one here.

The interview the next day was beyond skechy. The building they are located in is actually very nice. You walk into their office on the 6th floor and it looks really professional. A big tv on the wall, playing a sports channel to show they are a "serious" sports Marketing firm. But then one thing caught my eye, many many chairs in the waiting area by the receptionist, and yet the office i could see from my seat looked absolutely empty. There were a few desks, but only about 4 people walking around from what I could see, and no office supplies or computers/laptops anywhere. And the entire time I sat there and waited to be called in, the secretary was rapidly making phones calls to set up interviews... Hmmmmmm.

I am then greeted by a man, Aaron I believe? This Alex person was nowhere to be found, and the front desk woman had a different name. Aaron spoke to me at a rapid speed, brought me into the interview room and only asked me a few specific questions such as "How do you feel speaking to a CEO or just your average guy on the street? Can you talk to anyone?" and "What are your favorite sports teams?" which really just ended up being a way for him to list all the "clients" that they represent. Apparently they represent the Angels, the Kings, the semi-pro team the Reigns, and many other big team names in the area. He spoke about the company as if they were doing all their promotional marketing for the season. HA.

The interview lasted about 15 minutes total, with 90% being him talking and selling me how great the company is. Alright, cool. And in the end, when usually an interviewer asks, "Do you have any questions for us?" He says, "Alright so are you free tomorrow at 9am for your second round interview?" I thought perhaps my resume had spoken for itself, but I tried to ask him what exactly the job title is and what I would be doing. He says that we can talk more about it tomorrow, but basically I will start as an entry level marketer and work my way up in a few months to being an account manager. I was told only two positions were open for it, because they are "rapidly expanding and need managers as soon as possible."

As I walk out of the interview, I get a quick glance to the back part of the office hidden by the receptionist area, and as I am being escorted out quickly, I see the empty offices in the back corner. I KNEW something was off, but being such a curious person (idiot) and eager for a job, I showed up the next day. Also, after leaving my first interview, a man from the 6th floor in a different office asked me "What exactly do the people in that office do?" I said marketing, and he just said "huh, ok." The writing was on the walls.

The next day I show up at 9 am to see that there are about 10 other people sitting in the waiting room area. That morning at around 7:30am, this Alex woman calls me again from a number in Fullerton, not Orange. Still no Alex to be found in the office. Aaron greets us at around 9:10am and this time the office is packed with "marketing managers" in suits walking around the back office. We each get paired with one manager, but LUCKILY I had another poor soul who came along with me. As each group left the office, I could hear the same thing being said to them over and over, almost robotically "Congratulations on making it to your second round interview. Here are Signals United, we believe in integrity..."

I won't reveal the name of the girl who interviewed with me, so let's call her Sarah. Sarah and I went with our account manager (whose name I cannot for the life of me remember so lets call her Amy). Amy goes outside with us and all the other groups and starts expalining our interview schedule. She wants to drive us to an on-site location of one of their clients, take us to lunch, and then head back to a different client before returning to the office. She spoke so quickly that we couldn't even get a question in if we tried. She explained that today we will be working with the Kings and of course Sarah and I look at each other with excitement to be able to see how marketing works with such a big sports team. Silly us. So instead of us being able to take our own cars, Amy insists that we get into her car so that she can learn more about us. We agree. Like idiots.

She is asking us usual questions of what our past jobs were like etc, but I notice that we were driving for a while, and my suspicions sank in even more. I tried to ask about why there was nothing online about the company and she says "Oh we have many company names since there are so many international and domestic offices, this one is just new." Ok, so then I ask why the back offices were empty if they had supposedly been in that office for a year, she says "Oh i mean we switched offices within the building, we are still expanding rapidly and needed more space." She shows us some letter from the Anaheim Angels thanking their company for the hard work after she notices my skeptical tone, and I see that the company name listed on top is called "Smart Circle International." I quickly look them up on my phone, and low and behold they have scam written all over their Glassdoor account. Oh great.

At this point, I'm desperately hoping we get off the freeway soon so that I can uber back to my car. But no, instead we drive for over an hour and end up in RIALTO of all places. She tells us that is where the client is, and when she leaves the car for a minute to talk to a coworker of hers, I quickly turn to Sarah and say "Please tell me you are as sketched out as I am." She agrees, and we form an escape plan to have someone pick us up so that we can leave. We needed some time until they would get there, so we followed Amy on her work tutotiral. Amy isnt walking to an office of the KIngs. Instead, she is walking to a shady industrial area with multiple tiny offices (two were mechanics, one was definitely a sweat shop, another looked like a box collector, you get the idea). She went up to each place, spoke to literally anyone she could find, in order to sell TICKETS. That's right. SHE SELLS A TICKET PACKAGE from her "CLIENTS" of buy one ticket get 7 free. Yeah, this isn't marketing. This is door to door sales. And I don't care what promises they make, there is zero marketing in this scheme. They are a pyramid scheme, trying to get as many people as possible to sell these tickets.

Sarah and I finally start asking more questions, and all Amy can say is "I will answer that at lunch, you need to stay focused on my technique right now." We ask how long we are staying, and she says "I wont be leaving the area until about 5pm." We were kidnapped and taken to the end of the world, and the vague little paper we signed at the beginning of the day saying "We will not be paid for today's interview" was starting to make way more sense. After having more time to do research on the car ride home with Sarah and her friend who picked us up, I found out their "brother company" has been known to make people work 6 days a week, tell their employees family is less important than money, and promise huge paychecks but always found a way to diminish people's work so that they could argue why they deserve less.

I really hope everyone steers clear of this place, and if you have experience with them please report it. I made many mistakes. I went to a place that had no background information, I stupidly got into a car with a stranger, and I did not follow my gut on all the things that did not seem right. At least now I can warn people and hope that they see this when they do their research online.