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Main Area and Open Discussion => Living Room => Topic started by: mouser on February 06, 2006, 09:33 AM

Title: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on February 06, 2006, 09:33 AM

Article about Geurilla marketing and NVIDIA paying people to build up reputations on forums so that they can later say good things about the product:

About a week ago, The Consumerist stumbled upon claims made by various gaming websites (specifically, Elite Bastards and Beyond3D) that graphics chip manufacturer Nvidia, in cooperation with the Arbuthnot Entertainment Group (AEG), had seeded various gaming and PC hardware enthusiast sites with pro-Nvidia shills. That is to say, that AEG would hire employees to create ‘personas’ in various gaming communities, slowly building up the trust of other members by frequent posting unrelated to Nvidia, to later cash in that trust with message board postings talking up the positive qualities of Nvidia’s products.

http://www.consumerist.com/consumer/evil/did-nvidia-hire-online-actors-to-promote-their-products-152874.php


[link from boingboing] (http://www.boingboing.net)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Carol Haynes on February 06, 2006, 09:38 AM
Should this be a surprise? Given the amount of 'advertising' on the internet theses days (and the depths that some of these 'advertisers' will plumb) I would be very surprised if any possible method is not being exploited openly and covertly.

Add to that the large web-factions that have gotten 'religion' when it comes to browser wars, operating system, platform etc. then almost anything printed on a webpage should be taken with a pinch of salt!
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on February 06, 2006, 09:40 AM
i've posted this and made it sticky because i want everyone on this forum to pay attention to this completely outrageous technique of marketing.

the intention of DonationCoder.com is to be a helpful resource for the members of this site.
we hope also to be friendly and helpful to companies and programmers, especially small independent coders; especially donationware and freeware coders, but also to shareware authors.

i see it as a win-win situation when companies offer discounts and get some attention here, and members get a good discount.

i have my own personal opinions about software i love, and i expect many of you do as well, and we all want to hear when someone genuinely loves or hates a program.  i think the mini reviews by members are one of the great resources on the site (thanks zaine for making us give this a higher profile).


i have no reason to suspect anyone on this site would be promoting a program for reasons other than their own true feelings, but it needs to be said that if you say good things about a product and you have some connections to the company or some financial interest, and you do not reveal this fact, we would look on this in an extremely serious and negative light, and would take action to make sure that everyone knows such a company could not be trusted.

the same goes for the reviews, etc.  posting positive comments about a program in return for payment is wholly unacceptable and will not be tolerated.  there is always a danger of such things because companies try hard to get good word of mouth.  but keep in mind that if we find out such a thing has ocurred it will end up hurting your company in a much more severe way.


[note: this does not prevent authors or people affiliated with a company from posting a comment about their application or recommending it, you must simply make clear that you are affiliated with the product].
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: allen on February 10, 2006, 01:31 PM
Here's some followup on the story (http://www.joystiq.com/2006/02/10/nvidia-in-full-damage-control-mode/)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: db90h on February 22, 2006, 02:51 PM
Oh, you mean this is wrong?<g>

The number of companies doing this is larger than we could imagine.

The solution? Other than publicly castrating companies that get caught, there isn't much that can be done.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Baseman on March 06, 2006, 12:08 PM
Well...That's one way of making money from a pack of lies and dishonesty... :mad:...But then have you ever sat down and watched TV ads?...Especially the slimming  ads...All those beautiful girls with attractive  bodies, and body building guys... that they use in the ads? and they ask you if you'd like to look like them...by their product and you'll notice after so many days the difference... Come on give me a break...No amount of their products are going to make one look handsome, beautiful and young again like them ads on TV...So there are so many companies competing and always say their products are the best...Why not use natural, ordinary people and really get down to brass and tacks and see how the product really works?...If at all...
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Carol Haynes on March 06, 2006, 01:27 PM
Especially the slimming  ads...All those beautiful girls with attractive  bodies, and body building guys... that they use in the ads?
-Baseman (March 06, 2006, 12:08 PM)

I love the ads for wrinkle creams with 12 year old models saying "I use xxxx and look I have no wrinkles" - it isn't a lie as such but ... give me a break.

It also annoys me when they use pseudo scientific jargon to sound plausible assuming that women are too stupid to realise it is complete bollocks!
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Hirudin on March 07, 2006, 10:49 PM
Tactics like these really piss me off! However, had known earlier: I probably would still have bought my NVIDIA® GeForce® 7800GTX (http://www.nvidia.com/page/geforce_7800.html)!

Not only because it is actually CHEAPER than the competition, but because it delivers blazing frame rates and today’s most advanced features—including support for Microsoft® DirectX® 9.0 Shader Model 3.0, high dynamic-range (HDR) lighting, and NVIDIA® SLI™ multi-GPU technology. NVIDIA GeForce GPUs deliver the ultimate performance and ultra-realistic effects on today’s hottest games.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Dell[a] on June 04, 2006, 10:16 PM
well, i better get paid for writing that widget song....

<<giggle>>

 :P
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Jimdoria on June 15, 2006, 05:01 PM
This is not just a net thing, by the way, although the net certainly spawned it. It's the hottest new trend in the world of marketing. Using ordinary people to shill for products. Often the people are not paid for their "work" or are given some kind of token or pittance. Many people do it just for the thrill of it, or because it gives them some sense of power.

It happened when some marketing types observed that certain people in social networking environments (like Friendster) had more connections than others. These tended to be people who sat at the edges of un-related networks of friends. They also tended to be people whom others saw as trendsetters, and whom others looked to for advice. They were the "hubs" that connected many people.

The idea dawned: if we could get these people to push our product, it would be as powerful as having a friend recommend it, but even greater, because these people have SO MANY friends.

Now there are agencies that specialize in this kind of marketing by seeking out such individuals and offering them small incentives to push products. These stealth marketers then go around chatting up the products at family gatherings, club meetings, parties, etc. I'd guess there's an online component as well. It's surprising the number of people who have jumped at the offer. (Or maybe not surprising when you consider that the type of person who has such a large social network probably has many superficial, transient friendships rather than a few deep, abiding ones.)

There was an article in the NY Times about this a while ago. It's behind the "Times Select" wall now, but if you have access you can read it:
The Hidden (In Plain Sight) Persuaders (http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20912FC3A5A0C768CDDAB0994DC404482)

Many of the takers saw no problem with this relationship. Some considered it innocuous, if the product was something they liked, used and would recommend anyway. And some genuinely liked the idea of secretly influencing their friends to do things for their own benefit. I guess the spirit of Machiavelli is alive and well, even if they don't read him anymore.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on June 19, 2006, 08:52 PM
recent blog post about bloggers getting paid to say nice things:
http://www.geeknewscentral.com/archives/006175.html

Paid Product Evangelist that hide they are getting Paid
I have a friend that is a pretty popular blogger, and I asked him today why he had been talking about a certain product so much. He confided in me that he was being paid to be a product evangelist. When I told him that I had never heard him disclose that he was getting paid to evangelize the product he said that his contract had forbid him from disclosing this.
...
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: zridling on August 22, 2006, 02:03 AM
Man I wish people would pay me to say the nice things I do about some of the software on my site (http://www.anova.org/software/), but that's exactly why I don't. I'd be like every other whore and take the money and write the glitter. What's worse than saying nice things about crappy software?

Oh yeah I forgot, this is it (http://www.riaa.com/default.asp).

PS: Hirudin — tell us more, don't leave us hanging!
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mitzevo on September 22, 2006, 08:26 PM
When you narrow it down basically all it is, is a job. Do the job, get your pay (in what ever form).

People work to make money, so they do the job. This happens to be a very good job (that benifits companies alot)..  and it goes on all over the place, not to mention all the techniques involved, like brainwashing.. influence... ;)

Other than that I found this topic a good 10minutes of reading =D
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on October 13, 2006, 08:59 AM
Here is a case where a company (Sprint) didn't get the great praise they had hoped for with the free phones they were giving away to bloggers:

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/09/19b.html

Over the last six months, Sprint has been trying to get bloggers (like me) to write about their new Power Vision Network by sending us free phones and letting us download music and movies and use the phones for free.

That’s rather nice of them, but honestly, I have a really strong aversion to writing about things just because some PR person wanted me to. Basically, there’s no better way to make me not want to write about something than to ask me to write about it. I accepted the free phone because, gosh, well, it’s a free phone, but I decided that I simply wouldn’t write about it no matter how much I liked it.

As it turns out, I had the opposite problem. The phone they sent me, an LG Fusic, is really quite awful, and the service, Power Vision, is tremendously misconceived and full of dumb features that don’t work right and cost way too much. So I’m going to review the dang phone anyway, even though if anybody from Sprint is paying attention they’re going to lose their lunch and some executive bonehead over there is going to go nuts and I sincerely hope that this doesn’t put an end to the entire free-phones-for-bloggers boondoggle, because I’d hate to get beaten up at Etech next year by all the other bloggers who would hate me for spoiling all the fun.


When it finally arrived, the physical appearance of the phone was rather disappointing. If you’ve been spoiled by Motorola’s latest phones, or the seamless, screwless, elegant iPod, the LG Fusic will strike you as butt-ugly. Where a Motorola RAZR has a solid case made out of almost sensual matte-black steel that just feels great, the LG Fusic is made out of the cheapest kind of gray plastic, the same material you find on a $3 toy. Where Motorola goes to great lengths to hide the screws, and minimize bumps and seams, the LG Fusic has dozens of ugly protuberances, gaps, holes, screws, seams, etc. Worst of all, the LG Fusic has no less than three of those evil, flimsy, rubbery plug-caps that are connected to the phone by the thinnest of filaments. You know, those stupid rubber plugs that you have to pull away to plug anything into the phone, and then they just dangle there like chicken wattles (when they’re not getting in the way of the thing you’re trying to plug in) for a couple of weeks until they finally tear off. The phone is almost twice as thick as a RAZR. It comes with a break-offable front plate which can be used to change the accent color of the very front of the phone. Your choices are Barbie Pink, Barbie Green, Barbie Blue, and Black which would be the only stylish choice, if only it didn’t clash so badly with the rest of the phone. (Believe me, it is hard to make black clash with anything, but LG did it.) Overall this phone seriously looks like a Fisher Price toy, not a top-of-the-line cell phone.

Read the full review...it gets even better.  ;D

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/09/19b.html
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: dmd on April 06, 2007, 06:52 AM
I really dont post here much but I should as I feel this is one of the better forums that I visit.
I am involved in Internet Marketing you know the guys you make fun of sometimes.   I run into this crap all the time and it gives many marketers a bad name.   I sometimes outsource work from places like script lance and elance etc.  and I constantly see jobs posted for things just like this,  I have a friend who is a writer trying to write that All American Novel and basicaly was going broke in the process.   Finaly his wife told him to either start making some money or get out (hehehe) He asked me for some help so I told him that many people are always looking for ghost writers and sent him to some of the freelancing sites.   Anyways to make a long story short  one of the jobs he had found was a Company was paying $2.00 a blog post to glorify their product.   He did this for a while because he is the type of guy that needs instant gratification and found it easier than researching and writing ebooks.  He asked me what I thought and I told him that I felt he was contributing to the trash that you find on the internet offering you to make 3000 - 5000.00 weekly.   I am not sure what he is doing now as far as work because everytime I tried to show him something it wasnt good enough and wanted to make money today.  He is basicaly lazy that way as he wants all the glory without putting in the work.   

Sorry I went off track here but, this is more common than you think, and is becoming part of SEO. There are companies that are paying people to post at forums just to gain the one way link.    Even if they say something crappy about the product and start a controversial discusssion, The company recieves the advantage of increased traffic from the forum post and the search engines pick up on it often resulting in a higher PR for the page that is the original posters sig file.   

Dennis
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: TucknDar on April 06, 2007, 07:44 AM
The sum of it is that you never know just how good or bad a product is until you've tried it yourself... :huh:
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: iphigenie on April 06, 2007, 08:27 AM
That's true.

But to me it seems far more cost effective to pay a researcher to go through many communities and identify people who are already positive about your products, then once you have identified them contact them and see if you can turn them into enthusiasts, via freebies and attention. Or risk it and go for people who are opinionated and influential but indifferent to your product, and get them to try it.

Since these people could still decide to be neutral or negative about your product, I don't see why it's so wrong. Or is it that if you are a journalist for a magazine it's ok to review stuff you got for free, and keep some, but if you write on the web it's not?

I suppose the disclosure is all

PS: I alas have had to pay for every single one of my graphics cards
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on April 06, 2007, 09:23 AM
I have been a member of a consumer testing group that does product testing & feedback for a number of companies, for a long time.

Some of these companies will even pay me to test and give them feedback, both positive & negative, about their product.

Sometimes I don't know what brand I am testing, but most of the time I do.

I recently tested some shampoo and conditioner of a very well known brand, for pay. (I am deliberately not telling what brand)

In the questionnaire I was sent, in addition to the usual product related questions that I am used to seeing and answering, there were a few more I have never seen before.


I think in addition to getting feedback from me on their product in order to improve it, they are hoping (naturally) to turn me into a regular customer and for free advertising by planting the thought in my mind to tell people about it...specifically in online chatrooms.

Now I don't know about anybody else, but shampoo isn't something that comes up much as a conversation topic in the chatrooms I hang out in. And as far as recommending a product, I would have to really love it to recommend it to someone.

I don't see anything wrong with recommending a product you have tried and like...for free. But that is the key...you have to believe in it or your recommendation is worthless. The minute you receive pay to say nice things, your credibility will go down the drain with me, as soon as I find out about it. From that day forward, I will never trust your recommendations about anything, ever again. I don't like sneaky advertising and people that try to pull the wool over my eyes.

Being sneaky about it is worse than google ads on my kitchen table, relevant to current conversation, over coffee. It doesn't belong there.

But it did get me thinking, and a little paranoid now, about product info from friends...specifically in chatrooms. Are companies paying people to sway the topic towards their product? Are any of my friends involved in this? Would they even tell me if they were?



(if the creators of the Python programming language could stand to make a profit from chatroom endorsements, I would be giving tinjaw the evil eye, right about now.)
;D
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: tinjaw on April 07, 2007, 05:00 PM
This is nothing new. Many people don't know that alcohol companies pay people go into bars and order drinks and ask for a certain brand. They do it early in the night when you can still hear people talk. Then they strike up conversation and mention the drink. This is also true for cigarette companies. Night club owners are also known to send people to other clubs, strike up a conversation and then mention that they are going back to the club owner's club.

I can also say that I am taking advantage of a similar offer. I won't say what yet, because I don't want to start the conversation that will inevitably ensue just yet, but I will be reviewing some software and will have a matching post/thread on this subject.

As they say, Stay Tuned (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/esmileys/gen3/1Small/WHISTLE.GIF)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: dk70 on April 07, 2007, 06:55 PM
Internet is lovely for cheap hidden advertising/spamming. Mercedes Benz Denmark recently send out test drive invitations to handpicked bloggers - of course followed by encouragement to blog about the experience. May be just a bright idea by local marketing dep. who have noticed something about viral ads, product placement - but could be worldwide tactics. What does BMW, Samsung etc. and do?

Tech world has always been the worst, may be because it is tied so closely to internet. Not sure anyone care/pay attention to this - part of the game, to be expected. Nvidia, ATI, Microsoft or whoever - all in it together. Listen to latest TWIT 93, from about 48:55 and 1.5 minute forward, a tiny battle between 2 of them ending with "So tell me about the last time you bought a computer product Mr. Ethics". I assume he was among those who got free notebook from MS so he could review Vista. Nice that such poor people get a helping hand ;) This does not cause a stir, seen as a joke I guess. How it is in tech world.

PS: I alas have had to pay for every single one of my graphics cards
-iphigenie (April 06, 2007, 08:27 AM)

If you review hardware parts I doubt you are telling the whole truth. Ok so you pay but only 50% right? ;) Ive seen a few sites/reviewers making a big deal out of the fact they DONT review handpicked/sent items from anyone but instead go out and buy them from random shop. I think that is very uncommon.

All this reminds me of why I dumped a local tech site/forum - like a small Cnet. Started out pretty good but then someone noticed one of their advertisers were a well known convicted idiot who have cheated for years. Dodgy online shops, spamming you name it. He just asked how it could be they accepted such a sponsor and got into big trouble with ADM powers. At first they rejected any talk of a problem but after some pushing finally had to announce they did not care as long as they benefited, and then complainer, who I wished was me, got banned. They also are fast to make articles about products kindly supplied by X shop etc. etc. Same old tricks. Since much of internet works because of outside monetary influences no use in crying, cant be avoided - Google ads are here to stay. Matter of being able to look people in the eye and giving them facts - whatever they are. Full disclosure allowing enough transparency for people to see who have an interest in what or nothing - if none consider content advertising. Nvidias straw men were annoying because nobody likes the feeling of being tricked. Mercedes Benz invite got known because one of the bloggers did not have a driving license but she do have a podcast, heh. Did not like being seen as a tool. Others might see this as chance of getting nice rebate on next car.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: CWuestefeld on April 09, 2007, 01:49 PM
Where do you draw the line? If we say that you can't accept money for reviews, must we also say you can't accept anything of value for reviews? That is, is it wrong for me to accept a license to a piece of software in order to review it? I'm assuming this is OK (and I've done so myself), but how is the income I derive from free software different?

Of course, I have always disclosed any such arrangement. Is it simply the transparency that's important?
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on April 09, 2007, 03:18 PM
Where do you draw the line? If we say that you can't accept money for reviews, must we also say you can't accept anything of value for reviews? That is, is it wrong for me to accept a license to a piece of software in order to review it? I'm assuming this is OK (and I've done so myself), but how is the income I derive from free software different?

Of course, I have always disclosed any such arrangement. Is it simply the transparency that's important?
-CWuestefeld (April 09, 2007, 01:49 PM)

If you are reviewing 20 applications in the same category, and 15 of them are shareware, and you receive 7 reviewers licenses, when it is all over and done with, how many of those 20 applications are you going to keep installed? Is the free reviewers license going to alter your opinion of the software and influence what you will say about it before you even take a look at it? Will that free reviewers license determine which you keep installed, if any? Would you represent crapware as the greatest thing since sliced bread just because you got a free reviewers license?

When I was researching screensaver software, I didn't receive any reviewers licenses. I tried many...uninstalled all when it was over...even the freeware ones.

What I ended up keeping was the one I had installed before my research began...the one I paid for a long time ago. Why? Because it is still my favorite. (mouser & I had differing opinions on which was the best...different requirements to base our opinions on)

If I had received a free reviewers license for all of them, it still would have ended up the same way. I still would have liked that same application best...and still would have uninstalled the rest. And the crappy ones would have still been crappy and I wouldn't have been afraid to say so.

I think where the line is drawn is where the intention sits.

Are they giving you the free license in exchange for good words about their product? (This is being paid)
Or are they giving you the license to enable you to give them a fair chance, to enable you to evaluate whether or not the extra features you get when you pay for their product are actually worth the price? (This is not being paid)

What about when a company doesn't know beforehand that you will be doing a review of their product, you like it and say good things about it, and when it's all over they surprise you with a free license as a 'thank you' for giving them some publicity?

You didn't say what you said in exchange for a free license...didn't say it hoping for one either. In this case I would think it would be OK to accept it. (this has happened to me only once, really surprised me, and I did add a mention of it to the thread (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=5893.0) I made about the application, which wasn't intended to be a review. I was just excited about it and wanted to share my find with the whole world.)

The bottom line is, YOU know what you are doing and why. Don't try to be sneaky and think you can fool us. Don't even think about it. You will lose all credibility and respect if it is found out that your intentions were less than pure.

Reviews should be done like a game of 'open poker', where all cards in play are on the table, face up, for everyone to see...there is nothing hidden, you can't bluff.

It shouldn't be done like a game of Bullshit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_(game)), where everyone has to guess if you are telling the truth or not.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mahesh2k on August 21, 2007, 10:14 AM
Companies like :

Norton Antivirus
Quickheal
MS
Srilippi
Tally

Are sending thier full products in market to let user evaluate then once they get enough userbase they start doing rade on user ocmputers and ask for license payment & claim as they are not registered.This is trick to promote product.But For MS it is not working as very few people are upgrading to Vista in asia.Even MS sending their full iso for vista people can't handle vista on their low end machine.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: leland on December 06, 2007, 11:46 AM
I don't post a lot, but when I post I am either trying to solve a problem or share solutions I have found or share my opinion about something I think is great.  I would not want to accept pay for saying I think something is great if it is not.  I also think it is bad to try to hide affiliations.  I started out on computers in programming.  Now days I do system administration.  I do sometimes post about products I love, like Directory Opus, but that is only because I truly do love the product and have been a user since the 90's when it was out for the Amiga.  It sickens me to think people would push lesser products just for cash, but I guese it all comes down to greed, plain and simple.  Very sad.  But I have found this forum to be great for finding things and the opinions here truly seem to be real.  That is great.  Thanks to everyone here for making this forum what it is; a place to be trusted, a place to call home.  :Thmbsup:

Leland
:D
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on December 06, 2007, 05:26 PM
 :) :) :)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Deozaan on December 16, 2007, 02:53 AM
I fully endorse this message and say that DonationCoder rocks and everyone needs to donate at least $250 dollars every 3 months to this site!  :Thmbsup: :Thmbsup: :Thmbsup: :Thmbsup: :Thmbsup: :Thmbsup:

(Where's my check, mouser?)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Sugar on August 15, 2008, 01:14 AM
I only now saw this.  I want to say that I subscribe to ConsumerAffairs.Com.  The first thing at the top of their page says:   To cancel your subscription, please use this link.  You don't have to hunt to find out HOW do I cancel.

They list recalls, which companies are in bed with people in power, scams, health, etc.  It's not all positive nor negative and it is very informative.  If you ever wondered what's going on that is not on the news, this is a nice little ezine to read. It also lists recalls about everything I can think of. :Thmbsup:
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: capture on October 13, 2008, 01:42 AM
Another obnoxious "trend" is companies using Web Trends, Media-Click, Double-Click (spyware) to download a text file on your computer so they can mmmmmmm..... see where you browse and co-ordinate advertising based on your browsing history. When I clear my cache using CrapCleaner, my AVG picks up these files as part of the cleaning process, which I immediately put in the Virus Vault.

So, those people who are paying these spies to install this junk on your computer are basically wasting their money because if a program like AVG can pick up these files, then I'm sure that more sophisticated Anti-Virus/Anti-Spyware programs will probably be able to weed them out as well, even better.

Don't y'all just love spyware????

Thanks,
Claire
Chemainus, BC Canada
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Davidtheo on October 13, 2008, 03:01 AM
I believe that if someone wants to start a topic about a product with the intend to improve that products standing and they are getting paid, they should have the information or be in contact with the company where they can proved some technical or customer services for the said product.

A lot of people there know I work for Kingsoft and I have no problem in answering questions about there products I have even started some topics there about Kingsoft products but I have never told anyone I do not work for them. I prefer to answer questions in forums that are already talking about KS products 

What these people are doing comes close to and in some forums crosses the spamming line.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: nosh on October 13, 2008, 04:06 AM
I would give much more credibility to a product if the author/employee introducing it clearly mentions his affiliation right from the get-go, without anyone prodding for a clarification. Or better put, I would be completely put off a product if I suspect the person introducing it is withholding his/her affiliation. Just my $0.02
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on October 13, 2008, 05:11 PM
I recently discovered how this really works, with the most effective companies that are involved with paid posting, and the whole thing is quite scary.

1. They require their paid posters to be well established on the forums in which they make paid posts first, with a minimum number of 500 unpaid posts to their credit. This is to establish trust among the forum membership and lessen suspicion that they could be engaged in paid posting.

3. Paid posters must maintain a high ratio of unpaid posts to paid posts.

4. Paid posters must write original unique posts that are not duplicated, elsewhere.

5. They are only allowed to be paid once for an advertiser, and are forbidden from making a second post on another forum for that same product.

6. The forums they post on must be PR4 or higher and quite active.

The perfect candidates are people that have been long time members of a busy forum, and are trusted and respected by most of the members, and know what will and won't fit into the forum. They know the members of the forum quite well and the members know them. They are the ones that would never be suspected.

Take a look at the top 10 posters on this forum (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=stats). All of them would be perfect candidates for this type of paid posting, here. And if any of them did it, you probably wouldn't know it.

If we had one among us, they could easily post about an application "find" and start a software discussion about it. Or they could easily post in the living room about some "cool site" they discovered, directing traffic to it. Or post in the company compliments & complaints section, with something nice to say about some company. It's also likely that it would end up promoted to the blog (https://www.donationcoder.com/blog/).

If any of the top 10 posters in this forum was to do any of those things, we would never know if they were paid for it or not, would we? Could we ever be sure? We all make posts like that all the time here, don't we?

The ad companies that charge the most and pay the posters the highest, and offer the most effective advertising for your money, all work like this.

They don't send someone to a forum and pay them to sign up and make a post and say great stuff about some product, site, or service, on the first post. The companies offering that kind of spam advertising services are cheap and ineffective and nobody really wants to make posts for them or hire them to spread the word about their product, site, or service.

It's the good ad companies that are capable of pulling the wool over our eyes and the only choice we have is to either keep trusting who we already trust and try not to think about it, or look at everyone with suspicion each time we read a post on any forum made by someone with 500 or more posts to their credit.

I told you it was scary.



DISCLAIMER: Since I have more than 500 posts here and am also on the top 10 list, I feel the need to state that while I may have done some things during the course of my life that I am not proud of, paid posting isn't one of them. I would rather be homeless and starve to death than sell my integrity, and I do not engage in any type of paid posting, here or anywhere else.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mwb1100 on October 13, 2008, 06:12 PM
Hmm...  I guess we have to watch out for that mouser (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=2) guy then.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Deozaan on October 13, 2008, 07:00 PM
Hmm...  I guess we have to watch out for that mouser (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=2) guy then.
-mwb1100 (October 13, 2008, 06:12 PM)

 ;D
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: f0dder on October 13, 2008, 07:10 PM
Take a look at the top 10 posters on this forum (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=stats). All of them would be perfect candidates for this type of paid posting, here. And if any of them did it, you probably wouldn't know it.
-app103 (October 13, 2008, 05:11 PM)
But if any of us did that, it would probably be the same high quality posts we usually do, and thus the effect of it probably wouldn't be bad - even if the sub-morality of the things makes me nauseous. I really don't condone the idea, but at least it (probably) wouldn't result in the sub-par crap that spammers usually do.

Didn't know that anybody worked like this. Not that it really surprises me either, though.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on October 13, 2008, 07:53 PM
But if any of us did that, it would probably be the same high quality posts we usually do, and thus the effect of it probably wouldn't be bad - even if the sub-morality of the things makes me nauseous. I really don't condone the idea, but at least it (probably) wouldn't result in the sub-par crap that spammers usually do.
-f0dder (October 13, 2008, 07:10 PM)

Exactly! (as long as you don't know for sure that it's really going on and who is doing it)

A couple of months ago, a friend gave me info for 3 companies that he does paid posting for. I had no idea and I can't look at his posts on another forum without wondering now. (don't worry, he's not a member here...not his kind of forum)

He had good intentions when he told me, figuring I could make the money for a new pc much faster if I did paid posting. He was trying to help me by giving me this info, and info about some other less than desirable ways to make fast money online.  (at least to me they were)

He told me that between the 3 companies and the number of qualifying forums in which I am a member, I would make between $200-500 a month, if I worked for all 3 and did paid posts on all of the forums in which I have 500+ posts. This is what he's making from doing it on 2 forums, and he's even an admin on one of them.

I believe my response was "I'd rather sell my unwashed socks to foot fetish freaks on ebay, than do that." (no, I didn't do that, either...lol)

I didn't keep the info on the 3 companies and even if I had, I wouldn't link to them or give out the info to anyone. I happen to think the whole thing is dispicable, and I wouldn't want to promote or encourage this kind of thing.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on October 13, 2008, 08:04 PM
Hmm...  I guess we have to watch out for that mouser (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?action=profile;u=2) guy then.
-mwb1100 (October 13, 2008, 06:12 PM)

oh...by the way...

mouser just admitted (http://quotes.dcmembers.com/?106) to me that he does paid posting (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=15340.0). 

(https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/esmileys/gen3/4Medium/TFR1EA.gif)

Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: f0dder on October 13, 2008, 08:06 PM
With that kind of money, I can see why it would be tempting :o

But even though I don't view myself as having super extremely high moral standards1 (#post_foot1), I don't think I could make myself post positively about something I didn't personally like or use.

#1: or perhaps it's just that I don't follow all of normal society's rules and etiquette :)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Carol Haynes on October 14, 2008, 04:07 AM
What kind of money .... where do I sign up.  :D

Oops ... drat  :-[
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Kamel on November 12, 2008, 05:18 PM
Actually, there is a way to deal with this. In the terms and conditions of your message board, you can force agreement of terms and conditions before allowing registration. In those terms and conditions, add a line that states

"Posting messages, public, private, or otherwise, for the purpose of advertisement, is against the terms of service and can result in an immediate and permanent ban along with removal of any/all of the content contributed by the user. Any post made here (donationcoder.com), be it the opinion of the user or not, which was posted in return for any product, service, or financial reward is strictly prohibited by the terms of service."

I just made that up, so it hasn't been thoroughly checked for any 'loopholes' or anything, but it would most definitely be a start to get rid of this. Businesses have to play by the rules, and this form of advertisement should be illegal. If for no other reason, because the forum owner should be responsible for the price of advertisement on the said board. If a person is paid to advertise something on the message boards, the owner of the forums who has paid money and put his sweat into making a successful message board is completely left out of any dividends received by the advertising.

If I were to ever do a review website (something I've wanted to do several times, actually) I would add a mission statement to the front page explaining my policy in detail about receiving money and kickbacks from companies regarding their product.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Sobczak on January 07, 2009, 03:09 AM
This is another type of advertisement ofcourse our people is also believes the advertisement almost.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on January 19, 2009, 02:30 PM
"Exclusive: Belkin’s Development Rep is Hiring People to Write Fake Positive Amazon Reviews"
http://www.thedailybackground.com/2009/01/16/exclusive-belkins-development-rep-is-hiring-people-to-write-fake-positive-amazon-reviews/?ref=email
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Carol Haynes on January 19, 2009, 04:27 PM
What Amazon (and other sellers) should do (worldwide) is to state in ALL BELKIN product descriptions that reviews cannot be trusted and that Belkin business practices are highly dubious and immoral. Buy this item at your own risk.

They should then remove all 5 * ratings and refuse to stock products so that customers know if they order things they will have to wait.

If Belkin don't want to sell through these sellers any more it is only a bonus to the sellers' credibility.

I have bought a number of Belkin products over the years - the best that can be said for them is that they are generally cheaper than the competition but none of them worked well or for an extended period. Their drivers and software are generally very poor.

I wonder if they will give me 65 cents for that one ;)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on January 19, 2009, 04:41 PM
Agreed carol -- these things need to be punished swiftly and harshly if we are to discourage them.

In fact you could go further and say that amazon should put a giant sticker on every belkin product page for a year saying the reviews and company cannot be trusted.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Deozaan on January 19, 2009, 11:04 PM
What Amazon (and other sellers) should do (worldwide) is to state in ALL BELKIN product descriptions that reviews cannot be trusted and that Belkin business practices are highly dubious and immoral. Buy this item at your own risk.
-Carol Haynes (January 19, 2009, 04:27 PM)

Actually, it seems that only positive reviews cannot be trusted.

What's scary about a situation like this is that anybody who didn't like a certain company could do something like this to make the company lose most of its credibility. I could go post an advertisement asking people to give positive reviews for D-Link, then send in the link to the advertisement as a news tip somewhere, and the internets would get all fired up over it before the truth was all revealed.

Of course, in this specific situation, it does indeed seem to be a Belkin employee doing this, but as I said, potentially this could be done as an attack on a company rather than a result of unethical practices.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Blackleo on February 18, 2009, 04:23 PM
Wow they should pay me to say good things >.<
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: MilesAhead on July 13, 2009, 11:24 PM
With that kind of money, I can see why it would be tempting :o

But even though I don't view myself as having super extremely high moral standards1 (#post_foot1), I don't think I could make myself post positively about something I didn't personally like or use.

...
-f0dder (October 13, 2008, 08:06 PM)

I feel the same way.  Now if I could find companies to pay me to criticize crummy software I didn't like anyway... best of both worlds?   :eusa_dance:
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: vizacc on July 14, 2009, 07:18 AM
Hi there,

We're doing lengthy QA on our products, websites and other things here. We're always looking for people to look with "critical eye" and "severe fault-finding".

Drop us a note if you're interested...

Protocol is:

a) contact us, or drop us private message on donation coder.
b) we contact you, negotiate price,
c) you look/ or try to find faults with our products
d) more feedback --> more money.

this is private non-published review in other words.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: Jaan Tamm on August 13, 2009, 05:23 AM
Really?
wow...
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: cyberdiva on August 13, 2009, 09:59 AM
We're doing lengthy QA on our products, websites and other things here. We're always looking for people to look with "critical eye" and "severe fault-finding".
-vizacc (July 14, 2009, 07:18 AM)

It would be helpful if you mentioned what your products, websites, etc. are.  That way, people can judge whether they're interested and qualified to make a knowledgeable assessment.
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mouser on August 13, 2009, 10:46 AM
It would be helpful if you mentioned what your products, websites, etc. are.
yeah but not in this thread please -- this thread is about addressing bad behavior.
Title: Companies paying PR companies to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: housetier on August 22, 2009, 04:53 PM
This is just in on TechCrunch (http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/22/cheating-the-app-store-pr-firm-has-interns-post-positive-reviews-for-clients/):



Reverb Communications is an extremely successful PR firm that claims to have “first party” and “personal” relationships with Apple.
(...)
Unfortunately, they don’t always follow the rules, and they have been stupid enough to tell that to prospective clients.
 (http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/22/cheating-the-app-store-pr-firm-has-interns-post-positive-reviews-for-clients/)
-http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/22/cheating-the-app-store-pr-firm-has-interns-post-positive-reviews-for-clients/

It is a nice long article but still seems unfinished: there is a lonely closing "div" tag at the end and we never get to read their response to Reverb's response. I hope they'll fix that soon.

In the meantime: read it (http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2009/08/22/cheating-the-app-store-pr-firm-has-interns-post-positive-reviews-for-clients/)
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: app103 on September 11, 2009, 07:28 PM
A communications manager at DeLonghi caught writing 5-star reviews for high-end DeLonghi products on Amazon.com. DeLonghi's official statement admits it and defends it. The company thinks there is nothing wrong with it.

http://blogs.wsj.com/wallet/2009/07/09/delonghis-strange-brew-tracking-down-fake-amazon-raves/

Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: olla86 on September 22, 2009, 09:38 AM
Very interesting,app103! But I think it is not OK... :-\
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: bleh75 on March 28, 2010, 05:08 PM
Should this be a surprise? Given the amount of 'advertising' on the internet theses days (and the depths that some of these 'advertisers' will plumb) I would be very surprised if any possible method is not being exploited openly and covertly.

Add to that the large web-factions that have gotten 'religion' when it comes to browser wars, operating system, platform etc. then almost anything printed on a webpage should be taken with a pinch of salt!
-Carol Haynes (February 06, 2006, 09:38 AM)

Well said  :Thmbsup:
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: petertech on July 25, 2010, 10:12 PM
For me it is no surprise. Today where large companies spend millions of dollars in advertising, and did not look at ways to attract new customers. Not only are these two corporations that pay for people to say wonders of their products in the specialty forums, there certainly a lot more.
Sugerir uma tradução melhor. ;D
Title: Re: Companies paying people to say good things about their products on forums
Post by: mark1959 on October 24, 2010, 03:15 AM
This kind of stuff is on the increase and pretty widespread already.

few years back I'd always look around for reviews on just about anything I was looking to buy. These days I discount almost all of them except if they're on one site that I trust.