[Alaister]

Originally Posted by Andyhenry

My one humble request moving forward is that you talk to Allen about what used to make great information and genuinely great offers of high quality members products stand out, and keep in mind how to let the gold shine through the noise, so that as you get more new members they have some way to calm the noise and find a safe haven of pure good advice that is offered from a genuine place and not driven by a sales process.

We're all looking to continue our success and share with others, but I've seen many good people reduce the frequency of their visits because of the presence of trolls and the effort required to make good information visible in the massive flow of posts.

I wish you all the best in your efforts and would like to thank Allen once more for the amazing way he has looked after the forum over the years, and the members for the way in which they have supported each other.

Andy

Thanks for your feedback and thoughts Andy!

Do you find that right now it's harder to find the quality information?

[WillR]

Originally Posted by Rus Sells

There is no correlation between the quality of an offer and the price to list the offer guys.

I'll have to strongly disagree with you on that one.

The lower the barrier to entry the more low quality vendors you will attract. I don't think there is any question about that.

[WillR]

Alaister,

I would also like to have your clarification on an issue. In the past the WSO forum was a place for posting special offers that were only for members of this forum. The same product could be selling outside of the forum at a higher price or not selling outside of the forum at all. But either way it was a special UNIQUE offer being made to members of this forum only.

When I now scroll down through the first page of WSO's and click on a few of them, I see nothing more than WSO posts that have been created to simply link back to someone's site. This was not how things used to work. The offer had to be posted in this forum. The rules got laxed over the years and so now people come in here and look at the forum as just a cheap and quick way to get some more traffic over to their site.

This has definitely been one of the reasons the WSO forum has been on a steady decline the last 1-2 years. It went from being a forum where only high quality special offers were being made to members of this forum, to now just basically an advertising board where anyone can post a thread to throw traffic back at their wesbite. Thus why the organic traffic has dropped off so much. No one wants to come and just look through what is basically an advertising board of cheap offers.

So my question is this. Will you guys be taking the WSO forum back to what it was always supposed to be? I think you have a slight chance of saving the WSO forum if you did that now and enforced the rules and put up the listing fees. You'd have a marketplace full of only high quality products that are unique offers only to members of this community.

But if it just continues on how it is now, well we all know the direction it has been going the last year. Sadly.

[GlenH]

Originally Posted by WillR

Alaister,

I would also like to have your clarification on an issue. In the past the WSO forum was a place for posting special offers that were only for members of this forum. The same product could be selling outside of the forum at a higher price or not selling outside of the forum at all. But either way it was a special offer being made to members of this forum only.

When I now scroll down through the first page of WSO's and click on a few of them, I see nothing more than WSO posts that have been submitted just to leak traffic back to someone's site. This was not how things used to work. The offer had to be posted in this forum. The rules got laxed over the years and so now people come in here and look at the forum as just a cheap and quick way to get some more traffic over to their site.

This has definitely been one of the reasons the WSO forum has been on a steady decline the last 1-2 years. It went from being a forum where only high quality special offers were being made to members of this forum, to now just basically an advertising board where anyone can post a thread to throw traffic back at their wesbite. Thus why the organic traffic has dropped off so much. No one wants to come and just look through what is basically an advertising board of cheap offers.

So my question is this. Will you guys be taking the WSO forum back to what it was always supposed to be? I think you have a slight chance of saving the WSO forum if you did that now and enforced the rules and put up the listing fees. You'd have a marketplace full of only high quality products that are unique offers only to members of this community.

But if it just continues on how it is now, well we all know the direction it has been going the last year. Sadly.

Alaister,

In all my time on this forum I have seen the same thing happening as WillR has described. Particularly in the last 2 years.

The decision you make and the direction you decide to take the WSO forum will determine whether it forges ahead, or goes the other way.

[webbie]

Congratulations Allen. You made a smart move and at the same time still helping WF grow and evolve for the benefit of all.

I'm breaking out my best bottle of scotch in a toast to you and your success, health and happiness!

Dave

[anwiii]

well, i got the news when everyone else did but didn't really want to comment until now. i hear so many people comment in how great this merger is when people don't even know what the hell the plan is yet. i am sure allen did what was best for himself and more importantly what he thought was best for the forum, but what exactly is that? what's the mission statement going to be? where is the vision in all this? why freelancer.com specifically?

then you have people like willr and others stating how horrible it is to lower the price of the wso's and complaining about how the wso forum operates when they are the same people who made their living off it. why don't they like the changes? it's not because there will be more crappy wso's. this never affected them before. it's because it will potentially put money in the pockets of other people willing to create a wso now. if money is spread in to those who create their first wso now, it means less money in the pockets of those who had made their living in that forum. in my own opinion the cost of a wso might even be MORE now that they lowered the cost because you have to consider that there will be more wso's in the future now which means the listings will get to the 3rd page more quicker which means one would have to bump their offer more often. also, when people recognize how fast offers are sliding down, they will be more apt to view the offers more frequently.

in the end though, there will be changes. we've already seen a few. nobody knows right now what those changes are going to be or the vision for this forum until it is clearly stated. people can state how great this merger is or how crappy certain changes are, but all they are doing is is focusing blindly on an imaginary concept when they have failed to realize the bigger picture. what's the bigger picture? who the hell knows yet.

right now i think people should be carefull with their praises, and at the same time be carefull with their objections(mainly focused on the wso forum change). until they/we know what that bigger picture and vision is for this forum and THEN make an informed opinion.

[BetterContentWriting]

Hmm.. I'm a WF member, and I'm a FL member (as a freelance writer, as mentioned in another post concerning Arun's great WSO). But what are the exact benefits now (apart from the 20 bucks WF+ membership and listings)? I'm not really a friend of the way FL tears the money out of its members pockets, sorry to say that. And I also don't like the way quality work is sold out there (eg: $1.25 for 500 words -- minus FL fees of 10% which are taken as soon as you get the job, but you haven't written any word and you haven't received a penny... and you have to play this game if you do want a job -- or change the side and buy cheap work and resell it over and over again... really: who wants either?). Maybe time has come to write a nice report (WSO) about these things to open the public's eyes? Well, we'll see what'll happen...

[WillR]

Originally Posted by anwiii

then you have people like willr and others stating how horrible it is to lower the price of the wso's and complaining about how the wso forum operates when they are the same people who made their living off it. why don't they like the changes? it's not because there will be more crappy wso's. this never affected them before. it's because it will potentially put money in the pockets of other people willing to create a wso now. if money is spread in to those who create their first wso now, it means less money in the pockets of those who had made their living in that forum. in my own opinion the cost of a wso might even be MORE now that they lowered the cost because you have to consider that there will be more wso's in the future now which means the listings will get to the 3rd page more quicker which means one would have to bump their offer more often. also, when people recognize how fast offers are sliding down, they will be more apt to view the offers more frequently.

You couldn't be any further from the truth if you tried... sorry.

I make hardly any money from the WSO forum anymore. It's a MINUTE part of my business these days. Why? Because the quality of offers has gone down hill FAST the last 1-2 years. What happens when the quality is crap? Yes, you guessed it. Less people visit the forum so there are less people looking at offers and no one makes any sales. So we all move on elsewhere which is what happened the last 12 months.

You can lower the WSO fee as low as you want -- I really don't care since it's not going to affect my income. My point is it would be a shame to see that part of the forum continue on the downward spiral it's currently experiencing. It is cheap and crappy offers that sent the WSO forum on it's down-turn and lowering the barrier to entry is only ever going to let more crap through the door and thus crash that part of the forum into the ground.

I am just giving my opinion based on what I see. I barely use the WSO forum nowadays for that very reason. I have spent $40,000+ in WSO bumps just the last two years. So do you think the forum owners are trying to attract the seller with low quality products who bump their $20 WSO one every month or someone like me who was prepared to bump my offers for $40 most days of the week?

That decision is up to them. Again, I can only give my opinion.

Originally Posted by anwiii

it's because it will potentially put money in the pockets of other people willing to create a wso now.

That one sentence backs up my entire point. If someone is not prepared to create and list a WSO for $40 but all of a sudden they are now prepared to create and list a WSO at $20, what does that really tell you about their business and how serious they are about things?

If you are not prepared to invest a measly $40 into launching a WSO then sorry, but you either are not serious enough about things or you have no confidence in the product you are selling... usually for good reason.

[sbucciarel]

Originally Posted by WillR

So my question is this. Will you guys be taking the WSO forum back to what it was always supposed to be? I think you have a slight chance of saving the WSO forum if you did that now and enforced the rules and put up the listing fees. You'd have a marketplace full of only high quality products that are unique offers only to members of this community

I rarely run a WSO, while I agree that the $40 pricing put a barrier up to keep out some junk offers, I don't think that the $40 pricing insures that offers will be high quality and I think that the WSO forum and the other sales forums IS primarily an advertising venue and most certainly NOT for members only.

Since when did you actually have to be a member of this forum to hit the BUY button and buy a product? Never in my memory. As long as the products are available to the public, as they should be IMO, it's simply a great way to advertise.

Why anyone would care whether or not the sales pitch leads the buyer to the sellers' own page is beyond me, as long as the same WSO rules are adhered to ... like being a special price not found elsewhere and sellers having to honor their refund policies, etc.

If someone is not prepared to create and list a WSO for $40 but all of a sudden they are now prepared to create and list a WSO at $20, what does that tell you about their business and how serious they really are about things?

This I agree with, but like everything, there are actually some people who pay $20 who do have high quality offers and by the same token, some who pay $40 who sell crap.

[abdul786]

Originally Posted by WillR

Alaister,

I would also like to have your clarification on an issue. In the past the WSO forum was a place for posting special offers that were only for members of this forum. The same product could be selling outside of the forum at a higher price or not selling outside of the forum at all. But either way it was a special UNIQUE offer being made to members of this forum only.

When I now scroll down through the first page of WSO's and click on a few of them, I see nothing more than WSO posts that have been created to simply link back to someone's site. This was not how things used to work. The offer had to be posted in this forum. The rules got laxed over the years and so now people come in here and look at the forum as just a cheap and quick way to get some more traffic over to their site.

This has definitely been one of the reasons the WSO forum has been on a steady decline the last 1-2 years. It went from being a forum where only high quality special offers were being made to members of this forum, to now just basically an advertising board where anyone can post a thread to throw traffic back at their wesbite. Thus why the organic traffic has dropped off so much. No one wants to come and just look through what is basically an advertising board of cheap offers.

So my question is this. Will you guys be taking the WSO forum back to what it was always supposed to be? I think you have a slight chance of saving the WSO forum if you did that now and enforced the rules and put up the listing fees. You'd have a marketplace full of only high quality products that are unique offers only to members of this community.

But if it just continues on how it is now, well we all know the direction it has been going the last year. Sadly.

+1 from me.

Just compare the difference in quality of WSOs over the years... I'm disappointed with the fact that WSO section is becoming a hub of "Let me tell you the $10K/m scheme" which never even worked for those thread posters.

There was a time when we used to think 50 times before finalizing our WSO copy and launching the product, making sure the value is there in the product unlike today where sellers just start a thread knowing they're going to lose $20.... Quality must come back to WarriorForum. Price is just one but important factor. I'll happily pay $50 rather than having my listing going down every time the page was refreshed.

As WillR explained the price factor, I would also add better moderation of WSOs and more proper categorization of offers that can be helpful in bringing back the charm of what we call Warrior Special Offers.

Abdul

[Adie]

Well I hope the new owners will not ask for payment for everything similar to freelancer.com. Honestly I left freelancer a couple of years ago because of some payment problems. I hope this will not happen with WF...

[Kay King]

I looked at the first page of WSOs and what I see are a dozen or so WSOs that originally launched in 2010-2012 and a few from 2013. Someone suggests "taking it back to what it was supposed to be" but do you know what that was initially?

Back then quite a few members had WSOs they ran once or twice a year. There was a time limit of about 3 weeks on WSO's and then they disappeared. They were not permanent ads.

The best WSOs I ever purchased were years ago when the WSO section was FREE to run an ad. That's when they were real deals on real products - a few paragraphs rather than 20 pg sales spiels...and when the products were sold outside the WF as well.

The WSO section has undergone more changes over the years than the other parts of the forum - and I expect the trend will continue.

kay

[sbucciarel]

Originally Posted by Kay King

I looked at the first page of WSOs and what I see are a dozen or so WSOs that originally launched in 2010-2012 and a few from 2013. Someone suggests "taking it back to what it was supposed to be" but do you know what that was initially?

Back then quite a few members had WSOs they ran once or twice a year. There was a time limit of about 3 weeks on WSO's and then they disappeared. They were not permanent ads.

The best WSOs I ever purchased were years ago when the WSO section was FREE to run an ad. That's when they were real deals on real products - a few paragraphs rather than 20 pg sales spiels...and when the products were sold outside the WF as well.

The WSO section has undergone more changes over the years than the other parts of the forum - and I expect the trend will continue.

kay

You know, the thing is ... just like when you go to an electronic store or any store or respond to any ad anywhere, the buyer needs to be smart and do due diligence. The dreamers chasing easy money will flock to the income claim offers like moths to light no matter what anyone says.

It doesn't matter when I've bought WSOs ... they are nearly always outstanding. I don't and never have bought the "make easy money in your pjs" offers. I buy graphics, software, courses covering topics I need more info on (ecommerce courses awhile back come to mind), but never a product that promises I will make x amount of money in any amount of time.

This debate will rage on and on because inevitably, the buyers of those easy money offers will be disappointed. But that won't stop them from moving on to the next one, and the next one.

It's like, which came first? The easy money offers or the saps who buy them? Does it really matter? When the saps stop buying, the sellers will have no choice but to change direction, but we all know that's not going to happen any time soon.

[Paul Myers]

I have said over and over that the price of a listing is irrelevant to the quality of offers made. For those who doubt that, consider: The "golden days" of WSO quality - the time when the offers were the highest overall quality they've ever been - were back when listings cost $0.

Yes, really. It was, for years, free to list a WSO. And for all those years you almost never saw a dud offer.

What the new owners want to do with that section is up to them, but I can tell you flat out... If you're looking at the cost of ads as a solution to what you perceive to be a problem of offer quality, you're looking in the wrong direction. You're wasting a lot of time, energy, and attention on a non-issue.

There are things that are within the management's control, like what kinds of claims can be made, what is and is not allowed to be sold, specific terms like refund policies and delivery options, and other smaller stuff. There are things which aren't in their control, like the trend toward lower quality as the market gets bigger and less elite, the dominance of certain very large populations for whom the dollar goes much farther, and competition from places like Fiverr, which tend to further depress rates for certain types of products and services. (People just won't do quality work for those wages.)

I've watched this particular market since it first started, around 15 years ago. I was the one who originally decided that special offers for members were something that should be encouraged. Teresa King came up with the idea, I approved it, and for a lot of years the only way to get one posted was for Allen, Michael, or I to give it the nod.

A lot has changed since then, much of it outside the scope or influence of the forum itself.

The cost of an ad may affect the number of offers made, or the speed at which ads scroll off the first page, but it will not have any noticeable impact on the quality of offers.

If you believe there's a problem, you're not going to effect any useful change by focusing on the wrong parts of the process.

I've said this for years, it was one of the first things I mentioned to Alaister, and I'll repeat it here again: If you want to get rid of the majority of the "junk" fast, eliminate income claims and (more importantly) don't allow promises of specific results.

Boom. Done.

That would shut out a lot of people who can't sell on real benefits, eliminate any incentive for blind ads, and open a more attractive space for more programmers, graphic designers, quality writers, and other people with something to say that will stand on its own merit.

Of course, there's a problem with that, too. It shuts out the folks who really did make the money they claim, or who regularly deliver the results they promise. Balancing those opposing sides has, to this point, been beyond the scope and capabilities of the people handling those ads.

Either way, there are a lot of great people out there who have a lot to offer that don't want to try and compete for attention with "Make 6 figures a year with 4 mouse clicks a week." That's a much bigger deterrent to running ads than the $20 or $40 for the listing.

But yeah. Ignore the history. Stick with your guns, and waste everyone's time arguing about what the owners should charge for ad space. It's not like they have any experience with that, after all.

Oh. Wait. They do. Over a billion dollars worth...

Okay. I'm betting they have more than a few clues to rub together on this one.


Paul

[BetterContentWriting]

Originally Posted by Adie

Well I hope the new owners will not ask for payment for everything similar to freelancer.com. Honestly I left freelancer a couple of years ago because of some payment problems. I hope this will not happen with WF...

1+ and thanks for sharing your experiences... I fully agree with you.

Exactly that's their policy... Ever tried to tear your money from FL to your banking account or even to PayPal? And they're not very helpful if it comes to problems with employers who don't pay, just refer to their credo of asking for a milestone...

[anwiii]

willr- i know you live in another country. here in the u.s., we model the educational system around money. it's a huge problem because right now, most students can't afford to go to college. those who can get lucky enough to get grants and loans to go, can't pay the money back right away. end result? graduates end up trying to find a job in a field they never studeid just to pay back what they owe so they can take advantage of their degree. colleges now refuse to give out your transcripts even if you don't even owe the college any money but based on what you owe in student loans. i compare this model to the warrior forum where the more you charge to get someone published, the more you limit potential GREAT wso's. sure there there may be more crap wso, but is it really worth limiting them when you potentially limit the great ones? in my own opinion, absolutely not. end result is that if you limit the good ones because the cost to publish is too high, they aren't able to help others.

what made the internet and forum such as these such a great thing is that you aren't limited by money to spread information. sure there is bogus information floating around. it's not just in the wso forum, it's in other sections of the form and other areas of the internet. what keeps the bogus information in check though is people are able to respond to it easily through opinions and reviews where other people can be more informed to come up with their own opinion and/or decision.

also, the cost of a wso isn't just the $40 or $20 to post one. it's the cost of memebership to this site and this is something you are overlooking because if all your focused on in what the problem is is the money, they you have to consider all price points and not just narrow things down to one.

now i think it's fair to assume that you don't like the $40 to $20 change and you say it will cause the wso forum to go downhill. this has been your main argument against it even when you already admitted that you feel the wso forum has already gon downhill BEFORE the price change in the last couple years. like i said before, you(sorry to have used you as an example) and others are fixated on one thing and forming an opinion without even knowing all the facts including the vision for this forum and the future changes(which will be inevitable in the future).

i know that by lowering the price, there will be more bogus information and/or services, but since there is potential and opportunity for someone to come along with great information and/or services who now pay the lower price which will elliminate part of their fear and risk, everything sorta balances out better.

now you and i both know that your claims of bogus information isn't coming from you buying in to them. what happens when people are a member here looking at the information and then the opinions/reviews, the bumps, how a person writes, the support they give openly or not is that people are able to notice key elements of an offer which can suggest it might be good or down right horrible and only a way to get people on a list. by paying attention to key factors, we are able to wee through the b.s. without ever opting in or purchasing an offer. in the end though, opinions like yours or mine are subjective relative because everyone is in a different category(from newbie to expert) and subjective to what we already know. sometimes the best information for a newbie are the wso's that you or i consider crap, that are free, and even a wso that's only objective is to put someone on a list. unless we're psychic, we wont know if that one crap wso opened doors to this newbie. in fact, there is also a learning curve in marketing. it's inevitable that people will make mistakes. part of the mistakes people will make here on the forum will be to buy a wso that doesn't help them one bit but now they are more informed to make a better decision in the future.

personally, with the world economy the way it is, we should just feel lucky that there was a place like this to gather and gain information to hopefully be self suffient one day WITHOUT a job where the marketplace for jobs right now is HORRIBLE. the warrior form give the opportunity to others not to rely on a job, but their own selves. these guys may not have $40 or $60 to test something in this forum. by trying to eliminate the junk through a price point, you have now limited possibly unique and valuable information that not only could start putting food on the table for a family, but help others through the knowledge of the information that was shared.

[kencalhn]

one of your better posts, Paul (and I've read hundreds of 'em)...

- agree re no income claims/results, I thought all that was illegal under the FTC 2011 updated regulations anyways...the 'generally expected' vs 'results not typical' differentiation...in my ads/sites I specifically say 'no profitability nor performance claims of any kind are being made', which is what one is supposed to do, i thought. If i were freelancer from a risk mgmt standpoint I'd cleanse any infringing or borderline wso/any content here at all, period, and hire a compliance atty to do a compliance review, to get rid of anything non-FTC compliant in wsos, and update submission guidelines/review process.

ah back in the good old days years ago you could test out adding /wso in the browser bar to a lot of sites (w/o even checking the wso thread here), to see if there was a wso for it, which used to mean a discount from regular rates, as they were popular for discounting already-existing items

[RobinInTexas]

Originally Posted by Paul Myers

Bryan,

It was originally "The Warriors of Internet Marketing." The idea was to create a place where people talked about proactive marketing tactics, as opposed to the rather weak way most people went about selling online back then.

It expanded from there.


Paul

I guess you could say it was a million dollar idea

[franksvendsen]

Congrats Allen and Freelancer.com. Will be interesting to see what is changing. Hopefully not too much, as it seems this forum is working as it is

[TheMGMProject]

Originally Posted by mattbarrie

Effective immediately we are making a few permanent improvements to pricing:
* All WSO listings will now be reduced from $40 to $20
* All current War Room members will have their 20 year membership extended to lifetime, immediately. Moving forward new memberships will be $20 per year.

Matt Barrie

Would be cool to see a price reduction for classifieds ads too just saying

[Bacharoun]

awesome

[Jeannie Crabtree]

A big congratulations Allen... I have been here almost since the start and really appreciated the community you founded and your imput in the beginning years
and what you have done since.

And of course, welcome to Freelancer.com

[Alaister]

Originally Posted by WillR

Alaister,

I would also like to have your clarification on an issue. In the past the WSO forum was a place for posting special offers that were only for members of this forum. The same product could be selling outside of the forum at a higher price or not selling outside of the forum at all. But either way it was a special UNIQUE offer being made to members of this forum only.

When I now scroll down through the first page of WSO's and click on a few of them, I see nothing more than WSO posts that have been created to simply link back to someone's site. This was not how things used to work. The offer had to be posted in this forum. The rules got laxed over the years and so now people come in here and look at the forum as just a cheap and quick way to get some more traffic over to their site.

This has definitely been one of the reasons the WSO forum has been on a steady decline the last 1-2 years. It went from being a forum where only high quality special offers were being made to members of this forum, to now just basically an advertising board where anyone can post a thread to throw traffic back at their wesbite. Thus why the organic traffic has dropped off so much. No one wants to come and just look through what is basically an advertising board of cheap offers.

So my question is this. Will you guys be taking the WSO forum back to what it was always supposed to be? I think you have a slight chance of saving the WSO forum if you did that now and enforced the rules and put up the listing fees. You'd have a marketplace full of only high quality products that are unique offers only to members of this community.

But if it just continues on how it is now, well we all know the direction it has been going the last year. Sadly.

Hi Will,

Thanks for your thoughts around the WSO section. You make some really good points and from reading everyone's discussions and ideas I think everyone agrees that the quality has declined over time.

We decided to drop the price of WSO listing and bumping fee from $40 to $20 in order to stimulate activity and get more listings up. We haven't changed the moderation and quality standards at all. All WSOs still go through the same approval process. We're monitoring it all closely.

You mentioned that a lot of WSOs simply direct people out to other sites and that the section have become more of an "advertise my site" section. This is something I definitely want to remove.

I'll be working with the moderators and the team on revising the WSO rules and posting guidelines. Our goal will be to improve the quality of the WSOs as a whole and make sure that:

1) As a seller of WSOs you are able to gain value from selling your product/offer through Warrior Forum

2) As a buyer of WSOs you are able to confidently buy quality products

Stay tuned

[remarbarquilla]

Nice! The merging of two great sites.

[GlenH]

Originally Posted by Alaister

Hi Will,

Thanks for your thoughts around the WSO section. You make some really good points and from reading everyone's discussions and ideas I think everyone agrees that the quality has declined over time.

We decided to drop the price of WSO listing and bumping fee from $40 to $20 in order to stimulate activity and get more listings up. We haven't changed the moderation and quality standards at all. All WSOs still go through the same approval process. We're monitoring it all closely.

You mentioned that a lot of WSOs simply direct people out to other sites and that the section have become more of an "advertise my site" section. This is something I definitely want to remove.

I'll be working with the moderators and the team on revising the WSO rules and posting guidelines. Our goal will be to improve the quality of the WSOs as a whole and make sure that:

1) As a seller of WSOs you are able to gain value from selling your product/offer through Warrior Forum

2) As a buyer of WSOs you are able to confidently buy quality products

Stay tuned

Hi Alaister,


I think you’re starting to hone in on a few of the critical issues many members have been raising here

Along the same lines, I would be seriously looking at policing the prolific increase in WSO titles that are full of income claims.

At least then members will have a chance to really read though a WSO and understand what they’ll be getting, without being blinded by spurious income earning claims

Even if the member does have ‘legitimate’ proof that might back up a claim of income earning, IMO these income claims still should not be allowed in the WSO title.

You mentioned that a lot of WSOs simply direct people out to other sites and that the section have become more of an "advertise my site" section. This is something I definitely want to remove.

I would put a qualifier on this one because, very often a 'link out' from a WSO will be to a payment page (eg Clickbank) as I do, because I don't use Warrior + or JvZoo

[Alaister]

Originally Posted by GlenH

Hi Alaister,

Along the same lines, I would be seriously looking at policing the prolific increase in WSO titles that are full of income claims.

At least then members will have a chance to really read though a WSO and understand what they’ll be getting, without being blinded by spurious income earning claims

Even if the member does have ‘legitimate’ proof that might back up a claim of income earning, IMO these income claims still should not be allowed in the WSO title.

Hi Glen,

Thanks for your feedback!

Yes, income claims and income promises is something I've seen a lot of in the WSO section. I've also received quite a bit of feedback in regards to them.

I'll be looking at this in my revision of the new WSO rules and guidelines also.

I would put a qualifier on this one because, very often a 'link out' from a WSO will be to a payment page (eg Clickbank) as I do, because I don't use Warrior + or JvZoo

Great point! We won't be stopping external links like this. I'm talking about ones where they're just linking to their own product on just trying to use the WSO section as a traffic generation source.


Thanks for your constructive feedback GlenH, WillR and everyone. This is what will make Warrior Forum a better place!

[dee4d]

Congratulations Allen. The merger is good, let's wait for better opportunities.

[kindsvater]

I was conferring with Paul the other day about this, and I would ban income claims.

Many of these ideas also apply to the classifieds forum.

With the opportunity for a clean slate there are so many possibilities. As Kay mentioned, the WSO section originally was free. It was a place to try out ideas and offers and get feedback, while at the same offering deals for members. Products were mostly sold elsewhere.

The key was you had to be on the forum to see an offer.

W+ really changed that. Now, at least in my experience, the vast majority of WSO sales are driven by emails - aka affiliates of W+ / JV Zoo and other programs.

At $40 a listing there are not too many now posting an offer just to try out a headline or test a new type of sales format.

Although I understood why the financial setup happened, one could make product listings free if they were getting a percentage of each sale. That is what W+ thrives on. From a competitive perspective, I am surprised no one was able to do this and draw away listings.

JVZoo, for instance, has free listings. I was there on day 1 and saw the service immediately inundated with garbage. Doesn't mean there are not great offers on JV Zoo, there are, but the quality filter is largely done through affiliates deciding what to promote.

The result is that the emailing affiliates drive the traffic and sales. The wso section is just a place to post the offers, and the WF is the primary destination because Mike Lantz was smart enough to create W+ to work with the WF.

For that reason I believe the endless discussion for years about listing fees and listing terms and their impact on the popularity of the section is misplaced.

The questions are: what are the incentives for affiliates and the services providing the affiliate platform?

What are the incentives for someone to list on the WF?

I have always wondered if the listing fee could be reversed. For instance, the WF pays to list a product. Why get $40 when it could get a percentage of a huge seller? Maybe $40,000.

For example, working from a blank slate, what if the forum offered Frank Kern $100k up front for exclusive rights to sell his next product on the forum? Frank is a longtime, rarely seen member.

Suddenly, Kern has $100k in his pocket and hasn't sold anything. That is some incentive for him to sell here.

Presuming the forum's affiliate mechanisms can drive more sales than Kern could on his own, he has even more incentive.

For affiliates, they get something great to promote.

The forum would probably need to make a percentage of each sale. W+ could do this now, but hasn't.

The forum could offer buyers a discount on a War Room membership. If the forum made money from all product sales the ripple effect from extra traffic finding other products to promote may be interesting.

Anyway, as I said, with a blank slate the possibilities are unlimited.

.

[thriftgirl62]

I couldn't have said the following, especially the part in RED any better myself and I've been preaching that for years. Nothing GREAT has ever been created alone or someone would have done it by now.

Originally Posted by Joan Altz

I would like to see some kind of "Team WSO" section developed whereby marketers and workers of different skill sets would have the opportunity to join forces on WSO product creations and be able to share the profits as JV partners.

So instead of the Joint Venture forum, where someone is begging for help or offering to pay for a split, you'd have different marketers and workers with a variety of expertise who would apply to be a part of a team effort to create something outstanding, promote it, support it, etc...the team accomplishing something that each member by himself/herself could not do alone.

Warriors who want to collaborate would have extended profiles, listing their areas of expertise, and you would have project leaders who have a certain degree of credibility as marketers already who would be the "Initiators" of the proposed projects.

These could even be paid-for positions and team proposals.

Too many people here are riding it out alone and going nowhere. It's tough if you have limited funds, because the learning curve to truly get a handle on everything needed to turn a profit is actually very high. Then you have people with particular skills who are great at one or two things, but not good at others, and those weaknesses keep them from getting over the hump to success.

NOW, add this:

Originally Posted by jkennedy

This is a good point. On the flip-side, with more resources available comes more opportunity for better moderation and filtration of "junk" products.

"Better moderation comes from more available resources" by hiring 5 anonymous Freelancers who are paid to IMPLEMENT every WSO and then post their actual results in Comments 1 - 5 so they become part of the WSO.

No more giving away reviews for useless testimonials that never include any real results for obvious reasons. No more wasting time reading pages and pages of opinions and politically correct comments.

Affiliates with big lists decide which WSO gets the most traffic by promoting for each other. Who knows how many higher quality WSO's are missed because they only get promoted by a few smaller affiliates?

The commission being paid to affiliates would be better spent on advertising every WSO - 5 per banner for a week so they all get the same exposure. $20 for the WSO and $20 for the banner ad.

Originally Posted by Alaister

We want to intimately understand the value you guys gain from the Warrior for Hire section to make sure we do improve it and add more value.

I'd definitely be open to suggestions as to how you see us integrating with that section.

I'll send both you and Matt an email with some ideas on how to integrate those sections.

[sbucciarel]

Originally Posted by kindsvater

I have always wondered if the listing fee could be reversed. For instance, the WF pays to list a product. Why get $40 when it could get a percentage of a huge seller? Maybe $40,000.

For example, working from a blank slate, what if the forum offered Frank Kern $100k up front for exclusive rights to sell his next product on the forum? Frank is a longtime, rarely seen member.

Suddenly, Kern has $100k in his pocket and hasn't sold anything. That is some incentive for him to sell here.

Maybe that's a good idea for the elite Frank Kern type sellers (except that Frank Kern hates the Warrior Forum), but I doubt that it would go over with the vast majority of sellers who aren't selling thousands and thousands of dollars of products here. It's exactly the type of thing that I suspected could happen ... I call it Flippaizing the WF ... I doubt that they would go the pay the seller route. They would likely charge a listing fee and a commission, like Flippa does. The result of that move is that it's no longer profitable for the smaller sellers on Flippa to use Flippa.

[Andyhenry]

Originally Posted by Alaister

Thanks for your feedback and thoughts Andy!

Do you find that right now it's harder to find the quality information?

Yes.

There's so much information and so many people wanting to be perceived as experts (running the 'fake it til you make it' model), that I don't think it's easy at all, especially for newbies to tell the difference between someone who's never been successful talking about what they think would work, and someone sharing real experience and expertise.

I've resorted to ignoring most information from people until they have built up a level of credibility over time and many posts.

There are some members who have a low post count that I would read anything they post and many members with high post count who I would ignore anything they post.

So I can imagine how hard it must be for new joiners.

Andy

[zerofill]

Originally Posted by Andyhenry

There are some members who have a low post count that I would read anything they post and many members with high post count who I would ignore anything they post.

So I can imagine how hard it must be for new joiners.

That pretty much sums it up.

There have always been too many parrots, that repeat what they hear. They have no data to prove what they are saying as fact. This makes it awfully hard for new people to ever know what the hell to believe.

They can easily think of the person we would ignore, as an authority.

I personally think the Warrior Forum should probably allow members to get a little more brutal on calling people out, making them support what they claim or state as fact.

First off, this is to new members...

If someone claims or states something, and it is a whole 2 sentences... with no real back story on how they came to know what they are talking about... don't believe it. Unless you have time to dedicate checking it out on your own. Before believing anything, always try to explore the ideas and test them. That is the only way to know if they were full of crap or not. Don't take for granted, people know what they are talking about. Probably 5% of the people on here know what the hell they are talking about.

I know in the past I have even been guilty of stating something, then not writing enough back story on how I came to the conclusion. Often people are lazy like me when it comes to posting, or don't have enough time to dedicate to it.

Just test things, explore what you read, before believing it... please.

[MrVideo]

Looking forward to seeing what happens now concerneing our experience... both sellers, JV & buyers.

[Dennis Gaskill]

Originally Posted by thriftgirl62

"Better moderation comes from more available resources" by hiring 5 anonymous Freelancers who are paid to IMPLEMENT every WSO and then post their actual results in Comments 1 - 5 so they become part of the WSO.

I don't think you realize the kind of impact that would have, let alone how impractical it is. Here's an example:

Suppose I sell a course in DIY search engine optimization. Someone would have to build a website, create content, and wait, because it can take months or even years to achieve worthwhile results.

If the person testing the course isn't already proficient in HTML and CSS coding, content creation, graphics production, and other technologies, then they'd have to learn that too, or pay someone else to do it.

The content creation would be an ongoing thing, at least several times a week, if not daily. You're going to tie that tester up for a long time. And even if the forum was to pay someone to do that, the results would still greatly depend on how skillful the tester was at keyword research, writing engaging content, and so forth. Those are things out of the control of the product creator.

It could takes a couple years before I could sell that WSO. I could think of dozens of examples like this.

I understand your desire to have the junk screened out, but there are many implications you're not considering. You could hire 50 testers and I'd bet there would still be a waiting line to place a WSO because there are a lot more WSOs placed than 5 (or 50) testers could possibly keep up with.

[deepakrajput]

Congrats Admin!

[freelanceronline]

Originally Posted by mattbarrie

Hello everyone!

This is Matt Barrie, Chief Executive of Freelancer.com.

I am pleased to announce that Warrior Forum has joined the Freelancer family.

We are excited and looking forward to working with you to better support the community.

Allen Says founded Warrior Forum in 1997 and I’ve personally watched the community grow to over 730,000 members, becoming the world’s largest Internet marketing forum.

We will be allocating substantial resources to further grow Warrior Forum! We will be dedicating engineers to build features and customer experience specialists to interact with the community in order to understand intimately what you like. They’ll be working closely with the moderators moving forward.

The most important thing, however, is that we listen to you- the community. We’ll be going through the suggestions section and would love to hear more about your ideas and feedback. I am really keen to hear from you!

Also please feel free to email me at matt@freelancer.com with any suggestions, ideas, and thoughts or just to touch base and introduce yourself.

Effective immediately we are making a few permanent improvements to pricing:
* All WSO listings will now be reduced from $40 to $20
* All current War Room members will have their 20 year membership extended to lifetime, immediately. Moving forward new memberships will be $20 per year.

Thank you for your support of Warrior Forum in the past and I look forward to working with you to take Warrior Forum to the next phase!

Regards,
Matt Barrie

indeed this will be great to organize too big thing into one. but want to know how you get inspiration of doing it? how you or Allen get this Idea?

[SolutionSecrets]

Will we WF members get special rate from Freelancer?

Or it will be same normal rate?

If both combine together with no special disc, that meant WF & Freelancer "So-called JV" just to build rep?

[Leigh Burke]

Exciting news! And great news about the WSO price-drop. Now is a better time than ever for anybody to start their web business!

[Debra Barrow]

Congratulations Allen! Thanks for wanting to make the Warrior Forum a truly great resource for Internet Marketers I've never regretted my decision to join. Whenever anyone asks me where to start in IM, I steer them here.

Debra

[ebusiness]

Very excited about this as anything that doesn't kill you indeed makes you stronger and i am sure the this well thought out merger of the WarriorForum with the Freelancer community will make us all stronger.

Ebusiness

[beasty513]

Warrior Forum won't be that different.

It's just under new ownership is all.

I'm glad for the new owner.

[mensshoponline]

Warrior Forum now owned by Freelancer.com International...

Watch this space, I'm not sure if it's the end of an era or the start of a very good one...wait and see...

Regards
Rick Nuske

[Reberk]

Great news Allen. Congrats from Turkey

[spoiledkid01]

Hi Allen,

In my opinion this is going to be the best step for the community. Specially the freelancer community on warrior forum.
I am a full time freelancer myself, Not really an active one on freelancer.com though due to lower rates (Sorry Matt Barrie, but this is the truth).
I just hope this brings a new start for both of the communities.

Cheers,

Talha Awan

[AllieB]

Thank you Allen!

[rawhide]

Thanks Allen,This is why I became a Warrior. Glad to be here.

[sifcom]

Great News , Thanks Allen

[marciayudkin]

Will the Articles section be reopened?

Please, please?

Marcia Yudkin

[mccoypj]

Thanks for ALL you do, Allen...from a New member!

[cristianstan]

Congratulations Allen!!!!