Ad software escrow and feature promise tracker for buyers

When someone buys into an ad management tool based on a sales call where features are described as 'coming soon' or 'in beta,' there's no record of what was promised, no contractual hook to hold the vendor to a timeline, and no community signal about whether those promises are moving or stale. Users here describe paying for months, being unable to use the software, and getting silence from the vendor. One complaint describes features being 'in BETA without clear timelines for release' — which is common sales practice, but leaves the buyer with no recourse.

The gap exists because the people who get burned — often small agencies or solo media buyers — don't have legal departments or procurement teams who negotiate feature SLAs into contracts. Enterprise buyers get roadmap commitments in writing; everyone else gets a Loom video from the sales rep. Vendors know this, and 'coming soon' stays coming soon indefinitely with no consequence.

What's missing is a public, structured record that links a software vendor's stated roadmap commitments to actual ship dates — not reviews that say 'features promised not delivered' in general, but a specific log: vendor promised campaign duplication by Q2, it's now Q4, here are 12 buyers who were told the same thing. This gives buyers signal before they purchase, and gives vendors a reputational reason to actually ship.

This is a business and not a feature because the need is ongoing — new buyers are always entering a purchasing decision, existing users are always evaluating whether to stay or switch, and vendors are always making new promises. The data compounds over time: a vendor's promise-to-ship ratio over 24 months is worth far more than any single review.

What to build

Build a public database where buyers submit specific feature promises made during sales (with optional screenshot/email evidence), tag them to a vendor and a stated timeline, and the system tracks whether the feature shipped — aggregating per-vendor promise fulfillment rates visible to anyone evaluating that software.

Where to start

Launch with one category — social ad management tools specifically — and seed the database by manually logging every public complaint about undelivered features from G2, Capterra, and Reddit, so there's real data before the first user registers.

The hard part

Cold-start credibility is brutal — the database is worthless with 10 entries, and vendors will dispute submissions aggressively, so you need a moderation policy and enough volume to make the signal meaningful before anyone trusts it enough to submit.

How it makes money

Free to submit and browse; charge vendors a monthly fee to post an official response, provide a verified roadmap feed, or display a 'verified shipper' badge if their fulfillment rate crosses a threshold — vendors pay because the alternative is a public record they can't respond to.