How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo links?

[Fergal]

I've seen forums where a very helpful and long term member will occasionally include a promotional link in one of their posts. They don't do it very often, and they are members who are a great asset to the community.

How would you deal with a situation like that on your forum?

 

[pandaa]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

I think it's proper to remove the link if it's not in a promotional area, especially if you have rules specifying that those links shouldn't be posted like that. I think that if you let one person get away with it, it could easily become a board-wide trend. 🙁

 

[J Greig]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

I agree with what pandaa said. If you have forum guidelines stating that promotional links are not allowed in sections other than where they are allowed, you should remove them. Other members may see this and start to wonder why that member is allowed to do it, and they are not.

I would say that if they said something along the lines of:

Check my website, you will find great information regrading your situation.

It would be sufficient. Although, that wouldn't include any clickable links.

 

[CM30]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

What exactly do you mean by promo link? Do you mean an affiliate link with an id in? Or do you mean a link to their site or work in general?

For the former, I'd probably remove it. The latter? Not sure.

 

[Thanoz]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

If you don't want to let them go with it, just Pm them and ask THEM to remove them. I wouldn't remove them myself and then notify them. If they are members that care about the community they wouldn't have any issue and would understand.
Otherwise, make a special rank like "The old Helpful member" and let him keep it 😎

 

[VirusZero]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

If they made a post that was just like:

Hey, my site has tips for your situation here

I'd probably just delete their whole post. (It'd take less time than editing their post and it wouldn't leave a line without a link where it directs people to go. Plus, even without a link, I'd still class that as advertising anyway so I still wouldn't allow it to remain regardless.)
Then I'd send them a PM along the lines of:
"Hey, thanks for replying to help out <username>. However, please be aware that simply posting your link and directing people to it is a form of advertising that is not permitted here."

Though if they had quoted a section from their site that was relevant and then added at the end like: "There is more detail about this here." I'd possibly let that go, depending on how relevant the quoted section was and how much they quoted (if they only quoted like 2 lines? Sorry, nope... not good enough, have a PM warning against advertising), because their reply actually held useful info which was relevant to the user. Unlike in my first example where they just directed others to their site which not only is purely for advertising but also is rather spam like.

But then again, the only type of advertising I allow on my site is in signatures. (Anything else isn't allowed.)

And I don't personally care if they're a veteran member or a brand new one. I'm not going to make exceptions just because they've been around longer. (If anything they should know better since they have been around longer.)

 

[Fergal]

Re: How would you deal with a very helpful member's promo li

Thanks everyone for your ideas and suggestions. Personally I normally just edit the post to remove the link and leave it at that. That's not necessarily the best way to deal with it, however.

...Or do you mean a link to their site or work in general?..

Yes, that kind of link.