Do you try to get company spokesmen to join?

Discussion in 'Managing Your Online Community' started by Soliloquy, Jul 3, 2009.

  1. Soliloquy

    Soliloquy Regular Member

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    Has anyone gotten company representatives in your niche wanting to join? Do you encourage them to stay, post news and answer questions about their products, or do you see them as spammers?
     
    Soliloquy, Jul 3, 2009
    #1
  2. Wayne Luke

    Wayne Luke Regular Member

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    When I was administrator at SitePoint, we had verifiable people from Paypal, eBay, Google, Microsoft, and other companies as members.
     
    Wayne Luke, Jul 3, 2009
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  3. kev

    kev Regular Member

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    According to most of the members that replied to this thread - http://www.adminaddict.net/forum/ge.../i-dont-guess-being-good-member-matters-2145/


    Rules are rules. If you have a rule against self promoting threads, and a member post anything that promotes their own site, that person is a spammer and must be dealt with. It does not matter what their status is in the community, exceptions can not be made.

    My personal opinion - it depends on the persons status within the community.

    If they have been a member for 6+ months, have a few hundred post, sure I would let them make some self promoting post and threads.

    If they are a new member, I would ban them like any other spammer.

    I do not go looking for people to sign up on my forum. When I get big enough, they will find me.
     
    kev, Jul 3, 2009
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  4. Abomination

    Abomination Zealot

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    One of the key differences between my site and other similar sites is the company representatives are encouraged to join and post.
     
    Abomination, Jul 4, 2009
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  5. tryfuhl

    tryfuhl Champion

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    What if it's not self-promoting? You seem to hold grudges between that thread, this thread, and the thread about whose forum you'd like to take over.. your reason was to ban the guy... ease up killa
     
    tryfuhl, Jul 5, 2009
    #5
  6. torque

    torque Regular Member

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    I will change the question to suit what my website is about (my site is a sports site) and many clubs and associations in my area are seeing it as a good opportunity to come and chat without the media twisting the words - they will then have an open board to make any posts/announcements regarding their team upcoming days etc etc and I allow it.
     
    torque, Jul 5, 2009
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  7. Soliloquy

    Soliloquy Regular Member

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    I think there's a difference between actively promoting your site ("check out this product!") and using the forum to answer questions and interact with members of the community who might also be customers ("you can get better performance if you follow these instructions"). One will annoy users, the other they'll be grateful for.
     
    Soliloquy, Jul 5, 2009
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