When is it Acceptable to Post an External Link at WF?

Will, The moderators subscribe to the view that linking to your own site is almost always a No-No. Doing it repeatedly is self-promotional, and likely to earn the poster one of my Free Vacation Certificates.


Paul

Serious suggestion. Should there be a sticky with a link to Suzanne's pdf? I refer people to her for the link.

Pretty much what Garrie and Shaun said.

I think there are grey areas.

If people are complaining about being ripped off by Wordpress designers I might point them in the direction of my brother-in-law, which may be seen as some as promotional.

However, he is a fantastic designer, very creative, very professional and never misses a deadline, which is why I recommend him. If he wasn't such a "catch" I wouldn't do it.

N.B. Because this is a grey area I've deleted the link to his site in my sig file while this thread is active

Martin

That's not exactly what I said. External links to your own sites are generally removed by moderators when reported. The info I link to via pdf was created as a help to people trying to transfer sites. It's a pdf with nothing in it but instructions. It is not even an ebook. It was a chapter in an ebook I wrote.

The outbound links that usually stick are those that link to other sources (not yours) and sometimes even they are removed if it looks like a shill operation is going on.

Exactly,

You seem to be mistaken Rose. I have never asked this question before and it seemed to me to be worth discussing.

I think it's simple - if you are posting an ANSWER to a question and you post a link that provides HELPFUL, USEFUL information on the topic - you probably don't have a problem.

If you are posting "check this out" or posting in order to mention and display your own links....good luck with that. Let's face it - sometimes people reading what you post are smarter than you give them credit for.

kay

If you feel the information is so useful then why don't you have a link to it in your sig file? That is where you are supposed to put your links, not in posts.

I'm sure everyone thinks that their particular links are the most beneficial links in the world. Including this guy Building eCommerce Sites - Wholesale, Drop Shipping

Check it out quickly before it all disappears, but it is exactly what would happen here if link dropping were allowed by anyone at any time.

In your signature.

Also, this specific area of the forum is a discussion area.

If you want to post articles, there is a nice somewhat still new article forum here on the forum.

You nailed it.

This is why some people get to post occasional links to their own resources. It doesn't happen often, mind you, but it does happen. They've been here long enough for us to know what their intentions are likely to be, and the resource is almost always non-commercial.

The question of intent creates other problems, too. The classic example being people who comment on topics that are related to the products they sell. A lot of people report those as attempts to get signature exposure, and sometimes they are. You can usually tell the difference, though, by looking at the usefulness of the info in the posts.

It would be stupid to tell people they couldn't help others out on the topics they know the best - usually the ones on which they've created products, if they're in the IM field.

We usually decide based on the result. If the info is actively helpful and reasonably complete for the context, and they don't refer to their signature or products, we treat it as what it creates: Legitimate help. If they refer to their signature, or talk about their expertise and don't give any useful pointers, we treat it as promotion.

By looking at the result, we eliminate the debate over intent. It ceases to matter.

Of course, patterns still matter. Some people regularly post links to their own sites, and they're clearly looking to drive traffic through that. It's not evil or anything, but it tends to be disruptive to the flow of conversation, and, as you suggest, could become actively destructive if it was too common.

As with most things involved in keeping a forum useful, it's a matter of looking for the balance. You never get it perfect, and things are always a little wobbly, but that's not much different from walking. The way most people do it, it's controlled falling in a chosen direction.

The trick is to accept that it will never be perfect. That's okay. As long as it keeps going in the right direction, and people keep making progress toward their goals, it's a success.


Paul

That sounds like an excellent idea, Jeffrey.

I do know where the moderators are coming from. In LinkedIn, many of the groups are full of what I call "article" spam where none of the messages are real questions, instead people are just posting articles. Yes, the articles do generate some discussion, but the original poster often doesn't even come back and participate in the discussion.

So I have dumped most of my LinkedIn Groups and follow very few now.

I think posting your articles and guides on your Warrior Forum blog is a good way to give your articles more exposure and a way to provide a link to information where there wouldn't be a concern about affiliate links and advertising.