Have promotion threads lost their meaning?

[EncryptedWriting]

I might make a very hot take here, but I feel like promotion threads have lost their meaning entirely. It is not just promotion threads though, I feel like every topic has people spamming links to their comics or novels without even interacting with what the post is meant to do.

A large handful of folks go to any thread they see, no matter the topic, and just spam a link w/out any context. It can be COMPLETELY off topic, and they would still post their link with absolutely no connection to the thread. And then they just spam the forums with a link to their work. There is no soul, no information, no nothing to their posts. It is just a link.

I feel like promotion threads have almost completely lost their meaning. It used to be something where folks actually read one another's work and provided feedback. Or they actually interacted with the other person's work besides that of just subscribing. Now? Folks spam links hoping other folks will subscribe. But this, in the end, just leads to subs who don't actually engage with the work. What is the point of subscribing when there is no interaction beyond subscribing?

I don't know if I am being too harsh here, but I feel frustrated seeing the amount of folks here that are simply spamming the forums with a link to their work which is simply irrelevant to a topic. It is disrespectful to the owner of that thread, and it feels utterly thoughtless. Truth be told, it seems like promotion threads are just spam farms. No one engages with the works promoted. It's a subscribe than forget.

I rather have fewer subscribers that take the time to read and interact with my novels than a bunch of folks who subscribe but never read my stuff. Yknow?

If this is rude or anything, I apologize. it is not my intention to come off acting rude. However, I am completely frustrated here, and, truth be told, almost getting ready to leave the forums. Which absolutely sucks because the community here is lovely, but the amount of spamming and promotion threads has made things so... murky/muddy. You find a good, engaging, topic every now and then. However, a lot of other times it is the same "insert self link to work without even putting a sentence or just copy and pasting on every single thread".

Thoughts?

[Azifri]

I have the promotions category muted, so I don't know what threads you're talking about

I recommend you mute it as well. It makes the occasional spammer in other threads more tolerable ._.

[wolflu66]

I'm not against promotion or sub 4 sub behavior. However, lately I also feel that promotional posts have become too excessive.

I believe that promoting in just five or six discussion threads at once is actually enough for effective promotion, but recently there have indeed been people who push up thirty or forty promotional posts at once in a short time, causing the entire page to be filled with similar content, which pushes other topics down. I have to scroll down for a long time to see different content. This isn't fair to people discussing other topics

In fact, pushing dozens of promotional posts with the same content at once will only have a counterproductive effect. When others see dozens of replies with the same content from one person, they won't even want to click to see it.

[thepenmonster]

Thoughts?

People are making up excuses to spam their links in every thread they can find because they know 99% of the forum have the Promotions muted.

But at least they're putting in some sort of effort to disguise their spamming unlike the jabronis who just drop their links wherever.

[justanothernerdling]

Yeah it kinda feels like it honestly, tis why i don't engage in sub4sub either - but like you said, sometimes there's nice topics.

I've certainly taken advantage of some promos, but goodness some are just eeeeverywhere. Gets double tiring when, as you said, the links are pasted entirely off-topic

[justanothernerdling]

screenshot for those who have it muted! (The 2 truths and a lie is my attempt at fun promo haha but even there, people have been just pasting their links and running off)

[thepenmonster]

people have been just pasting their links and running off

I stopped reading the replies to my update posts the first second some dipshit showed up and demanded that I sub to their comic first.

[Leyelle]

I barely make promotion threads anymore and I only pop in here if I have an art topic/character topic to start or a game to create for people to play. the promotion topics get pretty redundant, and I'm tired of trying to come up with new ideas to switch things up tbh

[bumblebeelz]

I've been on Tapas for years, but only joined the forums a few days ago. The promotion spam was the first thing I noticed and it immediately put me off. If it stayed contained, it wouldn't be so bad, but... yeah. In my few hours of lurking, the number of people going off topic / spamming links was pretty high.

I'm glad to know you can mute categories, though. I just went and did that, and already the forum looks a lot better.

[Phoenix_fly]

Nope you are not being harsh or rude to anyone. That's a complete truth.
I am completely agree with you. There are many who just spam in every thread.

[Red_Dog]

I'm super new to the forums, but I've tried not to be too spam happy when it comes to that stuff.

I've tried to interact with the non-promotion type threads where people just share art and what-not and I did automatically assume that posting a link to my comic would be in bad taste.

It's all new to me so when I saw a new promotion thingy pop up I'd post a link and I'd try to have little teasers on some panels in a big collage here and there and was thinking about making a new one.

I wasn't aware that it was becoming a problem.

[MelancholicOtaku]

Nope you are not wrong about the decline of the promotion threads. Admittedly I do post in the chapter updates posts once a week but other than that I rarely post nowadays. About 90% of the promotion thread is sub4sub which I don’t partake in. Now if it’s a promotion that has a particular topic than I am willing to check that one out but even those slowly becoming a sub4sub. And as you guys pointed out it’s nothing but people spamming their links.

[annuskabriar]

oh damn thats annoying for the two truths and a lie. i thought that was a fun way to promote; promotional threads where you actually do something other than just spam your link

[Red_Dog]

If it helps I thought it was fun too.
I wanted to do something more creative with my post, but I was very tired. I haven't been sleeping much lately.

[Phantomobservant]

Honestly yeah I agree,it seems like copy paste mush with no true feeling.

[PapaDom]

The sad part in all of this is we tried to reduce the promotions but it never worked out. : /
When the mods were more active around here, they tried making a mega thread for keeping promos in one place: didn't work.
And we thought about possible solutions but that didn't work either.

-Getting rid of the promo category
That would just made another category the replacement for it.

-Telling people not to spam
Worked on a few people until a new member came with "Let me introduce myself 1 Billion times. "

-Trying more creative promo threads to interact with
It worked on a few core members and was actually fun until the numbers rose and the dumping started.

I don't understand their mindsets at all, like wtf dude? If I don't want to read your comic/novel on one post, doesn't make me want to check out the other 20.000 posts. Especially if you just post a link with "Pwease subswibe x3" instead of, idk, a actual fun qoute or something. But making the same thread over and over again, reusing really old threads or just straight up needing subs instead of introducing and being an active member right after the account was made is more doable for some reason.
"Sorry couldn't hear ya over my 1 Billion posts. Please check me out! Like and sub4sub and check out our kickstarter. "

Muting and flagging people for promo dumping seems the only reasonable solution right now. : /

[IndigoShirtProd]

I've been on the forums since 2019 and I can't recall a time when promotional threads didn't just devolve link dropping threads. It's always kind of been like this. The mods tried to put up a promotional mega thread to circumvent the problem and pinned it to the top of the forum. Unfortunately, people would still make new promotional threads anyway, and I think at some point the thread was unpinned.

It's hard to say something is rude when it's true. When I first got on here, I tried my hand at promotion a little bit. Didn't want to be too spammy or seem too desperate. But in doing that, you're overtaken by the noise of other creators who are, to put it nicely, less self-aware.

And, nothing against anyone else here, but I'm pretty against sub4sub threads. Past getting your first 15 subs, it doesn't really help your metrics. It can actually hurt in the long run since, apparently, having a lot of dead subs can result in worse placement in the algorhythm. Though, with the way technology works, that could have changed by now. Also, I just think sub4subs are annoying.

[Crusoe]

Yeah, it's unfortunate but I appreciate that you try to liven the place up! Honestly, for people who come here to casually chat/only promo in chats with a fun prompt it's best to mute the promo categories and try to lift up the fun ones.

Ive been on the forums for a long time and excessive promoing has always been an issue. The difference now is that it's gotten so bad it's hard to have a regular conversation.

[Phoenix_fly]

sub4subs are annoying

Yes, I am agree with it. If the work(Novel/Comics) is awesome or satisfying the readers then they will sub themselves.
Sub4sub is just annoying and nothing else.

[kyupol]

It's advertising. Like I'm driving and I see a billboard of Nike or Coca-Cola or anything political or religious... I just move on and forget it.

But it stays in the subconscious. The more you're bombarded with ads, the more likely you'll check something out.

The marketing rule of 7 is a marketing principle that states a potential customer must see a message at least 7 times before they'll be provoked to take an action.

Marketing Rule of 7's