Originally Posted by
Dzinerbear
AND WE HAVE COME FULL CIRCLE, Max.
How do you think a link list gets traffic. In the beginning, they take anything just to build traffic, build inventory, and get their product out there. Are they using people? Absolutely. "Wanna put up a FHG with three recip buttons? Sure go ahead. Whatever, just send me galleries."
Now keep in mind that a new link list owner is entering new territory. They have no idea what they're getting themselves into and there's lots to learn. And then, as those galleries start coming in and they start to see what webmasters are doing, the LL owner starts to learn new things.
One of my realizations was, "Geez, I've got a lot of webmasters who are just placing three buttons on a sponsor's FHG and submitting it. I could do that and I sure don't need 40 copies of the same FHG in my link list." So you create a rule that says you're not taking FHG anymore. This pisses off those webmasters who submitted them (and incidentally who helped you build the LL in the first place). But if the LL is going to survive long-term, you have to start offering a better product to the surfer.
When Adult Check collapsed, Mancheck raised their minimum picture requirement from 25 to 50, presumably because they didn't want to get inundated with lots of Adult Check's castoff garbage. They needed to maintain the integrity of their product or surfers would lose interest.
Likewise, when a LL starts getting inundated with lots of the same content, they may raise their standards from 12 pictures to 18. Again, a certain number of wm's are pissed off and start submitting.
If a LL is getting a lot of submissions using the content of one particular sponsor, they may start picking and choosing what galleries to list, or ultimately they may stop listing the sponsor altogether. No one wants a LL with 400 galleries a week promoting the same thing. The surfers will leave.
And that's how it works Max. The LL owner is constantly engaged in a battle trying to keep their product fresh. Yes, the product is the wm submission, but many wm's will continue to submit the same 40 picture sets from His First Huge Cock over and over again because they think they're making money. And maybe they are making some money. But they continue to be lured by that $35 PPS, so they keep doing the same thing even it is means they have to submit more of the same stuff. Someone has to give them a nudge to change because they won't do it themselves.
If a webmaster grabs the latest 450 FHGs from Gay Gravy and throws them up on 100 link lists, even if they get 10 sales a day, they think they're doing something. They don't understand that they themselves are helping to diminish their own future sales by inundating the market with the same product. Eventually they just move on to the next PPS sponsor and flood the market with his stuff. Or, as sometimes happens, LL owners start to say, "I don't want this sponsor's content anymore."
See Max, the AVS, TGP, Link List market is really a big cat and mouse game: webmasters do XYZ, the entity (AVS/TGP/LL) has to implement a policy to forbid XYZ or institute a policy that only allows WXY but not Z. This pushes webmasters in a new direction. As wm's figure out how to get around the new WXY policy and come up with ABC tactic, the entity has to come up with a new policy to counteract the negative effects of ABC tactic.
Please Max, run your own link list. You'll be amazed at how much work it is and how hard it is to build traffic. You'll see things from the other side. Actually it's been a great experience for me because it's really helped me figure out (a) what works and what doesn't, but (b) more importantly how to market my own stuff better.
AVS, LL, and TGP owners aren't out there just to be mean to webmasters -- well some are perhaps -- but they are only trying to protect their products so the surfers keep coming back. Whether you think they're offering a good product is irrelevant, it's the product they have to offer at the moment. It's the one they feel works for them. They may not improve their product in ways that you think they should because (a) they don't believe you, (b) they can't afford to, (c) they don't want to, (d) they're blind and think their product is perfect the way it is, or (e) any number of other reasons.
Once the surfers are gone, wm's aren't getting clicks and they stop submitting, and once the wm's are gone whatever surfers are left leave, too.
So set yourself up with a link list and you'll start to learn a whole bunch of new things. And you'll start to understand why LL owners do some of the things they do.
Michael
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