Do people really think high post count = successful, reputable and correct?

Well said Joe. If I were looking for advice I would really read through other peoples' posts and use my own intuition to form an opinion.

I think this post says it all really. In my eyes, it truly does not matter how many posts someone has, as long as the advice is sound, and not a load of flannel (rubbish).

As Joe says, it is human nature to trust people with a hugfe post count, as people think that it is a symbol of trust, but sadly it is not always the case, just need to look through the posts, and judge what is a quality post for yourself.

Very True!!

Or they spend too much time butting around the forums and too little actually growing their business. In my opinion, the only counter that matters is the dollar-counter, not the post-counter.

It's an argumentative question to ask - and would put someone on the defensive if he doesn't want to argue. You challenged him for a "reason" and he'll come up with one whether it's a good reason or not.

He may have the wrong view of post count - but he's also saying "I don't quite believe YOU". That's what you have to overcome...not post count.

kay

"Thanks" are tricky little suckers too though. Take a look through mine for example. Not all of those are because I gave someone great advice. Sometimes people just thank me because I took their side in an argument, posted something funny, or just posted in their thread at all.

I don't think there is a quantitative way to gauge someone's authority in a certain topic (unless you want to count college degrees, maybe). It is very much a mix of intuition and testing what people say to see if it holds up in a real world situation.

I hear you and you nailed it.

I just love how clearly you stated everything.

Sometimes, I tend to look at the number of thanked by other warriors. In fact, I just hit the "Thanks" button for this crystal clear input from you.

Other people have a high number of post counts because they have been here for a while. Hence, they know more about this forum particularly with the rules and regulations compared to those folks who just joined. (including me )

,,.just my 2 cents!

Sincerely,
Louie Tugas

Trouble is, there's no rule about being full of it, and if everyone knows you're full of it that won't stop you from posting.

Hell, plenty of people here think I'm full of it, and it hasn't stopped me.

Bill, I have no idea which one of you is right...but it sure is enjoyable to watch the squabble...No one can claim either of you are not strong willed and that lessons will be learned.

YIPPEEE...I now have more authority, I just posted again. Everyone please thank me, I need an extra boost of authority...

btw, does anyone have that link to the Fiverr gig for Thanks on the Warrior Forum? Or for a gig for someone to boost my post count? Thanks....

Now, see, I have the opposite perspective - you're only right when you agree with me.

But that still makes both of us right something like 98% of the time

It is worth noting that many of my posts are effectively worthless. Someone asked what was in the War Room, and I responded "beer and vaginas" in really big bold letters and ALL CAPS. That post isn't worth a damn thing to anyone, but it raised my post count and I think three people thanked it.

That said, in the same thread, I answered three or four serious questions about the War Room with serious answers. None of those were particularly long or noteworthy posts, and pretty much anyone here could have answered them. They will probably not earn me any thanks, but hey, they do add to my post count.

I'm a lot prouder of the short, helpful posts than I am of the long diatribes about (say) SOPA or SEO or CPA or ethical business. But my posts about opinionated garbage and dumb jokes significantly outnumber the ones where I'm briefly and simply helping someone who honestly needs help.

If I only made those posts, I'd have a very low post count and chances are nobody would know who I am. I'd also have a very low thanks count.

Which is where Steven Wagenheim completely nails it. It depends on the body of work. A lot of people like me because I post stuff like "beer and vaginas," and think I'm smart because I run off at the mouth about my opinions. But what really matters is those short, helpful posts. I've probably made less than 500 of them since I got here.

I'm probably the last person who should be responding to this but what the heck.

Post count by itself means nothing.

I can sit here all day long and type...

"Nice post...I agree" and maybe even give a half hearted explanation why I agree
and be seen as a contributor. Believe me, it's not hard for a fiendishly clever
person to appear to be intelligent.

So again, post count in and of itself means nothing.

But, combined with other factors, it can mean a lot.

Read most of Paul Myers posts, even the ones where he's dealing with
a forum trouble maker. There is more wisdom in Paul's posts than in most
Internet marketing ebooks.

His is the only newsletter that I read regularly, but that's another subject.

There are others who post here a lot who are damn smart marketers but not
on every single subject.

I rarely see Alexa talk about anything other than article marketing because
that's what she knows the most...at least that's the way it appears to me.

There are people here who post a lot who have very specific areas that
they are knowledgeable in.

Don't ask me how to setup split testing software because I'll end up crashing
your server...or worse.

In order to evaluate the information given by people, you have to look at their
body of work. This is a catch 22 however because people who post a lot, well,
they have a lot to go through and practically speaking, you really can't. It's
much easier to go through the posts of somebody who has 100 posts. And
even that can be time consuming.

But just because somebody has ONLY 100 posts or even 10 posts doesn't
mean that they don't have a head on their shoulders.

If Donald Trump came to this forum tomorrow and signed up, and he made
just one post giving business advice, would you take it from him or would
you ignore it because he has only one post?

Can you see how ludicrous it would be to do the latter?

Too many people get hung up on appearances. And that's fine if you're trying
to be a fashion model. It's not fine if you're looking for business advice.

I read each post and block out the poster when I can. I then go back and
look who made the post if I think it was a good one. Sometimes I'll read a
great post from somebody who has only been here a short time.

I spend a lot of time these days over at the Magic The Gathering forum. I
know a lot about the game so I can tell who knows their stuff when they
post.

Do I see excellent posts by those with lots of posts and those with few posts?

Yes...and almost in equal amounts.

I'll admit. Some of the really great posters have been there a very long time
and know this game even better than I do and I've been playing for 17 years.
The wealth of knowledge they have is mind blowing.

But...and this is another variable in the mix...a new person to the game might
have a hard time telling who knows their stuff and who is just faking it
because some of the fakers are very clever.

If you fall into that category of not being able to tell, this is what you do.
Take the info and try to evaluate it logically. Does it make sense? Are there
holes in the theory?

Read the responses of some of the senior members who you already believe
to know their stuff like Paul Myers, especially if a mod chimes in. What do
they have to say? Do they agree or are they ripping the OP a new one
because the info, to them, is so blatantly bogus?

Is it easy to tell who to trust? No, it's not. That's why you have to be
very careful. Don't take any advice for the purposes of testing until you
run it by people who you do trust.

I'd like to say that there is a fool proof way to keep from taking bad advice
but there isn't. It's very easy to be conned simply because some people are
so good at it.

My 2 cents on the subject for whatever they're worth.

The two keys to success in any organization (Warrior Forum, companies, governments, churches, families, businesses, whatever) are Presence and Protocol.

Someone who posts 6000 posts has Presence--and we assume they have Protocol as well.

Someone who has 12 posts doesn't have Presence, making us less likely to believe they have Protocol. ^ ^

You are pretty spot-on with what you have said here. Warriors who have a high post count are considered to be seniors in this forum community.



Experience outranks everything.

If I made that comment I would have removed my signature so it looked like below... Not an accusation..just a recommendation.. But your point is well-taken. You will notice many of the most influential Warriors regularly remove their signature line when they are speaking about something which could be seen as overly promotional. Something which is easy to overlook.

V V V V

Think about it,

I could spend all day on this forum, talking and pretending to know what I'm talking about. I would easily have 10,000+ posts if I spent all day on here.

Or I could have less than 50 posts and be out there working, giving it everything I could.

There is really no way to tell. To me personally post count means zilch.

Post Count means nothing...

Many people can post a lot yet say nothing useful...or even disseminate incorrect information.

The Proof is in the Pudding...Not in the Post count...

I have to admit I assume someone with a high post count has been around a long time and therefore probably knows what they are talking about. Otherwise they would have been run off long ago.

More post means didn't banned for spamming.

More authority the most post are.

I am a bit of a cynic. I have only a couple of posts. But from my background I would just like to say do your research and form your own opinion.

Or because they are really that spammer? :rolleyes:

Being precise with facts and succinct in expression has far more impact on perception. But, that's just me.

Being around long isn't something you can solely rely on. This isn't just in business either. You could be playing a particular sport for half your life and still you're not a Michael Jordan or a Tiger Woods. Heck, being around long could more likely just mean you have a longer history and a longer time-window of opportunity to put skeletons in your closet.

Another interesting point is even if years of experience can make you more credible (and truthfully, it can if you made a good learning experience out of all that time), something like post count isn't the ultimate measure for it.

Take me for example, I may not have a lot of post counts here. I may not spend a lot of time here. However, seeing as how this subject touches on the bigger subject that is forum posting on the internet, I can still boast plenty of experience because I've been forum posting for years. Sure those forum posts weren't for anything work or business related but it still counts as experience in general internet forum posting.

Only because more people let them and don't try to be more critical.

Good point, if not a painful one. :p

Maybe cuz they thanked you for the laugh. :p

This forum is fortunate to have some very successful people on it that have post counts from 100 to thousands. Here's 2 hugely successful guys I always read posts from (check out the vast difference in post counts):-

Willie Crawford > 10,180 posts
J F Straw (Jim Straw) > 179 posts


Rich

Andy, I guess you are talking from personal experience with a post count of over 9000

Unless they make enough money that they have the freedom to decide how and where they spend their time. :p

Having the time to spend in a forum is not sure-fire evidence that someone is not making money.

Consider Willie Crawford. He has nearly twice the posts I do, and he still makes more money than I do dammit!!

I have to somewhat disagree and I say this as someone who has seen some very insightful (not to mention sensible) posts on another forum from people whose post count was like barely a hundred. On the other hand, I've seen posts by people with something like Veteran Member status and their posts are so out of tune with reality, I find myself constantly 'at war' with them.

Then again, I've had the reverse. I've found myself giving plenty of credit to senior members because their posts have so much wisdom. I've also met some whose posts are so few and so outta wack, I make it a point to set them straight before they hurt themselves.

*gasps*

*rushes to hide threads asking about how to sell trading cards on the net*

He did not tell you off because he had more posts than you... :p

He told you off, because it doesn't matter whether he gives more value here than he does now or before...

Actually, he thought he could do that because he's Mark Andrews and you're... well, not.

I would trust the surgeon who had the most posts on a popular surgery forum.

Your math seriously sucks!

WillR
Posts: 4,814
Since June 2010

Let's just call it 18 months as you did...

18 months times 30 days in each month = 540 days

4,814 posts divided by 540 days = 8.9 posts a day!!

And if he answers in two paragraphs as normal, he is probably only here about an hour a day, if that.

You make the time. I schedule two hours a day to participate in IM communities and stay abreast of what's going on in the industry. This is the internet, and we run on internet time here.

Um, no. That would be a post every five and a half minutes 24 hours a day.

View Profile: WillR

Total Posts: 4,814
Posts Per Day: 8.38

This is, however, roughly 267 posts a month.

Well actually Mark just likes to start his count over every few months just to make it fair.

The Caliban truth detector. LOL. Now that lifts my spirits, especially after I just lost a good domain.

No you couldn't ... you'd be banned long before you got a high post count. One thing those with a high post count don't have is thousands of one-liner meaningless posts.

How?

George Wright

Gotta watch what you infer from statistics.

Example: If you look just at the numbers, you'd think Andy, BigMike and I have nothing better to do than post. Until you realize that our post per day averages are all under 4. Doesn't take long to do that, especially when you add in the occasional ongoing discussion, in which it's easy to rack up 10 or more posts in a single quick thread.

Caliban's comments about "Thanks" are also right on point. Unless you know what they're for, the numbers are meaningless.

One person tried to break it down by thanks to posts ratios. Major fail. He didn't take into account when the thanks button was put in here. That was around August of 2008, by which time Andy and BigMike and I, and a whole lot of others, had already racked up thousands of posts. Kind of screws with those numbers, yes?

Context matters.

As a rule, though, you'll find the oldtimers (by which I mean, people who've been active members for 5 years or more) don't take post count to mean anything more than the number of times someone has posted something that didn't get deleted. It takes experience with the group to know who's credible, and on what topics.

That last part is important. For example, I can address most forms of writing, email publishing and a few other parts of the business with some reasonable degree of credibility. If I start talking about SEO at this point, just ignore anything I might be foolish enough to say. I'm pretty much clueless on the topic.

The senior folks would know that. Newer people might not.

And we always have that inflow of people with tons of experience who just don't post a lot. Jim Straw was mentioned earlier, and he is the perfect example. Huge experience in business (50+ years), as classy a guy as you're likely to meet, and very few posts. You won't find too many members who are more respected by folks who know him and his reputation.

Another good example is when John Reese first posted here. A bunch of clueless gits started bashing him, claiming he didn't know what he was talking about. While I was laughing at them for their stupidity, Jonathan Mizel posted something to the effect of "You idiots! Don't run Reese out of here, too!"

Pay attention to what's said, not who's saying it.


Paul

No truer words have been said.

I concur with these assessments.