fake posts Post Reply

[ding]

I used to trust these pages for "real" recommendations......but just lately I have seen so many fake posts, or rather......cheeky advertising where are people making up reviews/recommendations for each other. It's a shame that some of the pages are being used a marketing tool

Maybe i'm wrong......but the great thing about Nappy Valley for me was always reading other parents real life experiences........

[Annabel (admin)]

Hi Ding
Thanks for the post and the feedback.

It is a downside to the growth of NappyValleyNet that businesses will try and "game" the site by posing as happy customers. Most of the time these are relatively easy to spot, for example someone who has joined that day and posted a glowing review of a builder, but sometimes they are harder to identify.

If we feel a post is a fake we'll check the registration details (some companies are short-sighted enough to pose as a customer but register using their own company email address) and also email the poster to check they're genuine. If we don't hear anything, or it was posted by the company, we delete the post and if we don't feel happy with the reply we'll also delete the post. We probably delete two or three a week.

We also email companies who post too much even when they're up front about it. I know you didn't ask about this but I think its a related topic.

We're happy for companies to "introduce" themselves to the NVN community, but those that keep dropping in to conversations to boast about their abilities also find their posts deleted. We have to do this more, probably around three or four times a week. Sometimes this is because companies just don't understand the "etiquette" for social media and because they're being transparent we normally don't feel these posters are being duplicitous, just a bit clumsy.

So, this is a long winded way of saying we work hard to keep the integrity of NVN but we're only human and we do miss some posts.

If you feel something is a fake just email me or reply to the post saying "is this a fake?". A genuine poster will be happy to expound about their positive experience and those with slightly more shadowy motivations will probably go very quiet.

Hope this helps and any questions please shout!

Thanks again for using NVN

A

[ding]

Hi Annabel

Thank you so much for your response, it was very much appreciated. I wasn't in any way suggesting that this was the fault of Nappy Valley....far from it. This is a very difficult thing to monitor and almost impossible to prove. As an Admin, you have a very difficult job of looking out for these kinds of things!!!

Let's hope that these "advertisers" respect the board, and use it for the intended purpose

Thanks again for your reply xx