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Problems for Sponsors

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3 replies to this topic

#1 Anthony_Loera

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  • Location:Miami Florida

Posted 11 May 2022 - 11:04 PM


Hi Caliban and friends,
 
I am old enough to remember how Sponsors where supposed to bring in some money to help maintain this website. Unfortunately your current system is not workable, and I know you must be losing money.
 
I previously mentioned that your system was charging me, even though no banners were showing. I asked someone on your team how to work this out, and they suggested to cancel the existing recurring payments and simpy redo the sponsership online.
 
This of course, did not work.
 
Below is an attempt to put up a banner and be a Sponsor Longecity. It was unsuccessful because of existing technical issues:

 

Click Link
https://www.revgenet...t-ad-issues.mp4

 

Attached File  forum-sponsor-issues.png   240.76KB   0 downloads

 
Please fix this.
Now If you have abandoned the maintenance of this website, need cash to fix it or want to sell it. Have mind give me a call. 
 
Anthony Loera
RevGenetics



#2 caliban

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Posted 29 May 2022 - 12:03 PM

Hi Anthony 

 

Firstly, a huge THANK YOU   :~   - for your great support to this community over the years (those who remember, RevGenetics was also a brilliant partner in making our crowdsourced supplement Vimmortal available) -- but also for your incredible patience and perseverance. The video was really helpful in understanding the issue.

 

I spend quite a few hours trawling through legacy code. The ad booking is tied up with the general payment system and I'm always weary of breaking something or compromising security. Frustratingly, all particularly relevant bits seem to have been encrypted by the developers (apparently a third party provider to Invision who have long since moved on) and I can't even get to the part of the scrip that generates the confusion - not even on the display ('skin') which is silly and quite unusual for our software. Having said that, I am not a programmer by any stretch and it is also entirely possible that have missed something obvious!   

 

Firstly, (and this may be why the problem has not been noticed): there is a workaround, but it's a bit stupid:

it works IF you

1) link to a http not an https page    AND 2) upload your ad image manually, rather than link to it  AND  3) the image is not too large 

 

Then, there is another problem. This one we have known about for a while, but also can't seem to fix it properly: 

If two people book the same slot, the system doesn't cope well (This happened for you vs TheCarbonGroup ("Alive by Nature")) 

 

Now, of course this state of affairs is really not great. You are a saint for persisting but how many potential supporters have just walked away in frustration? 

 

Among the possible solutions: 

 

1) We abandon our dream of having a fully automated system. Sponsors work out a deal and we display the ads manually. This is always the fall-back option and one I would suggest for you at this point. Talk to Mind and we'll make it happen.  The downside to this is that it eats into volunteer time, is more prone to human error and while the personal communication can be very nice and helpful it could also introduce more of a relationship bias that we'd like to steer clear of with a non-profit like LongeCity. 

 

2) We abandon the bookable ads system and run ads via google or some other platform. Unfortunately, as you may have seen in the Members section a few years ago Google seemed to have changed their algorithm in a way that hurt us severely. Going through Google is likely to be less effective for both sides.  Alternative ad vendors are another issue: we tried that rou8te a few years ago and the results were not that great. 

 

3) We try to hire someone to fix the IT interface. Unfortunately this would not be a casual undertaking. Again, since this is payment related we'd need to make sure this was done properly and at this stage I'm unsure whether we can fix the problem in a manner that costs the org less that we'd be taking back in for the community even in the medium-to-long term. 

 

We'll be having a chat about these and other options internally, but I'd invite you or anyone interested to chime in here as well. 

 

Again, thanks for pointing this out and for your goodwill towards this community.



#3 Anthony_Loera

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Posted 31 May 2022 - 03:47 PM

Hi Caliban,

 

thanks for the response.

 

The workaround is doable, but may not be SEO friendly because of the use of http, rather than https. It's not a deal breaker of course, but as you know every little SEO tidbit helps the Google algo bring the forum up in it's rankings.

 

I think one of your team members said they put up a banner manually for me, but I am signed in and I don't see it. So I am not sure if they are still working on it.

 

This was the banner I was hoping would be placed on the supplements section and on the NAD section of the forum:

Attached File  Banner-Imminst-05112022.png   192.17KB   0 downloads

 

If you can message me the software you are using for the forum, maybe I can setup a test server somewhere to kick around that will help find a solution. Maybe we can also find a solution to the Google algo, which imho is severe if you want to bring in new sponsors (and new members). 

 

I am also seeing that longecity is shedding lots of traffic,

so fixing the Google algo maybe more important in the near term to increase traffic (that will attract sponsors):

Attached File  image_2022-05-31_114150159.png   232.93KB   0 downloads

 

If you want me to setup a test server we can look at (without any imminst posts, just test data) to see if the kinks can be worked out, let me know. I think you have a great forum here that may need to be updated to work with the Google algo and sponsors, I have been a big fan of it for years and simply don't want to see it go by the wayside.

 

Let me know your thoughts,

 

A

 


Edited by Anthony_Loera, 31 May 2022 - 03:48 PM.


#4 Anthony_Loera

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Posted 02 June 2022 - 03:54 PM

Caliban,

 

I was paying for my banner on the NAD+ forum.

Then it was not showing up.

Mind told me to retry it, to see if it would fix the issue.

I could not get it to run and asked mind to get it working.

 

Now I see "Alive By Nature" banner is there on the NAD forum after I reported the issue?

 

That is unfair, specially because I paid lots of money over a long time without my banner showing.

Get those guys out, we were in the middle of fixing my banner issues when they were added to the NAD+ forum.

 

Attached File  image_2022-06-02_115615427.png   44.71KB   0 downloads

 

Anthony 


Edited by Anthony_Loera, 02 June 2022 - 03:56 PM.





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