** Forum Influence & Voting System **

** Forum Influence & Voting System **

Joshua D.Pro Member
BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes

10/23/12 UPDATE: The Influence System Has been Removed from BiggerPockets.

INFLUENCE & VOTING

We've established a point system for the forums (soon to expand to our entire site), which takes into account a member’s participation. You can gain both positive and negative influence based upon what you do on the site.

The goal of this influence system is to reward those members who not only help their fellow users, but also those who help the forums to run smoothly. As you can see from the chart below, those who participate by posting will gain influence points. The real points come, however, when others deem your posts as helpful (by voting – see below), or when you help us to rid the site of junk & spam.

On the other hand, as you can see, the impact of spamming the site, not following the rules (we need to edit or delete your posts), or worse, is severe in terms of your influence points.

Voting

Members can vote for a forum topic or reply if they find it interesting or helpful. At the top right of any post, you’ll see a vote icon. Just click the icon and you’ll give an endorsement to that post, and influence points to the poster. FYI - You can’t vote for your own posts.

Inviting New Members

By helping BiggerPockets to grow through inviting your friends and colleagues to join you on the site, you can gain substantial influence points.

Influence Point System:

FORUMS
Action: Net Gain/Loss

Each reply to your post gets you: 1
Post New Topic: 5
Reply to topic: 4
Have your Post voted up: 10
You mark a post as spam; no gain unless removed by admin or mod. If removed: 20, if edited: 10

Have your post deleted: -50
Have your post edited -10
Banned from individual forum -200
Banned from all forums -1000

NOTE: Posts in our Marketplace and Dealmaking forums will not affect influence for the positive, but if you spam or break the rules in these forums, you will lose points.

BULLETINS

Post a Bulletin: 5
Comment on a Bulletin: 4
Each Comment on your bulletin: 2
Your Bulletin Deleted (SPAM): -50
Your Bulletin comment removed: -25

ARTICLES

Your article accepted to article directory:15
Comment on an article: 4
Each comment on your article gets you: 2
Your comment deleted from an article: -25

INVITES
You invite new member who creates ACTIVE account: 40

YOUR PROFILE
You upload a profile avatar: 10
Each profile text block completed: 5

PROMOTING BIGGERPOCKETS

Write a review or tips on using BiggerPockets on your blog: 200 for off-site blog/60 for on-site blog
Make a YouTube Video review or share tips on using BiggerPockets: 100

Notes for BP Promotions: PM me after the post or video has been published so we can add your points. Blog articles must be at least 200 words and videos must be at least 30 seconds. Users are limited to credit for 10 videos and 10 blog articles. Points are not guaranteed; low quality articles or videos may not result in influence points.

Last updated 10/8/10

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Most Popular Reply

Residential Real Estate Agent · Chandler, AZ · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 928 votes
15y

Kevin-

You have a 10:1 ratio (approximately) of influence to posts. I have done my own non-scientific method of analyzing this and found it to be about "right" for strictly RE posters.

Here are my findings:

Strictly posters and generally top posters carry roughly a 10:1 ratio. These are your J Scotts and Mike M's. They are generally forum posters (no bulletins or blogs)

Political posters carry closer to a 5:1 ratio. I think this is because they do not get as many influential points in political forums (and now no influence). There are still some very good RE posters but they also post a lot in the political forum, which reduces their ratio. J Scott seems to be the exception to this rule, and I think its because his RE posts usually garner a lot of votes and he posts quite a bit in the RE forums as well (and was voted top Rehab poster).

20:1 ratio posters are usually posters who do other activities than post in the forums (blogs, bulletins, etc.) These are your Bryan Hancocks, Steve Babiak, and Charles Perkins). Exception to this rule is Vikram who has a high influential ratio because his posts (like J Scotts) typically are very well thought out and have high vote counts.

So, in conclusion, your 10:1 ratio is spot on if you are just a RE forum poster.

Again, this is my non scientific analysis.

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137 Replies

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    17y

    We've completed the implementation of all Influence to the site, including invites and profile completeness.

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  • Commercial Real Estate Broker · North Hollywood, CA · Member since 2009 · 19 posts · 1 vote
    16y

    It is a good idea but it must be known especially to new people. I have just got punished with -200 influence points because I was not familiar with the rules. I propose that you put a link on the word "influence" directed to this forum so people will know about it.

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  • Commercial Real Estate Broker · North Hollywood, CA · Member since 2009 · 19 posts · 1 vote
    16y

    Another idea is to have some kind of programming that will have a popup warning window, only for the first 3 times somebody post on the forum. This way it will no distract from those who regularly using the forms but will give a fair warning to would be spammers.

    The intention is to get rid off spam but not to get rid off people who inadvertently spam, but still like to participate. Giving a big deduction in influence points may discourage good people from ever coming back and really contribute to the forum.

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  • Real Estate Investor · ten mile, TN · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 374 votes
    16y

    That is what really makes this site sooooo much better than the other sites. We believe in the person and their intelegence, we do not force them to see and read the rules by pushing it in front of them. We think they have the intellegence to read them for themselves, and when mistakes are made to overcome those mistakes, just like in the RE industry.

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  • Will BarnardPro Member
    Moderator
    Developer · Santa Clarita, CA · Member since 2008 · 15k+ posts · 10k+ votes
    16y

    Moshon,

    I don't think that is all necessary. As a first timer, when signing up, you have to read and click that your read the "terms of service" which include forum posting rules. It is apparent that you skipped that reading.

    If you are truly not a spammer and want to engae this site, you can bring your influence into the positive quite rapdily by making valid posts, partipate in bulletin discussions, blog posts, inviting friends and more. In fact, there are many ways to increase your influence rating.

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  • Commercial Real Estate Broker · North Hollywood, CA · Member since 2009 · 19 posts · 1 vote
    16y

    I'm not disagreeing with the concept of the "influence system" overall I think it is great. In my opinion by administrating too steep a punishment on new people we will lose few good people. You may say that it is not a big lose because they are spammers but maybe they simply didn’t read the rules. Frankly it is very easy to weed out real spammers at any time.

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  • Real Estate Investor · ten mile, TN · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 374 votes
    16y

    Such is life. It is very unintellegent to go into another country without reading up on that countries rules. So one must not assume that because it is ok where they came from that it will also be ok here.

    This is what makes Biggerpockets THE most influential RE site. We believe in your intellegence while we also respect your views.

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  • Will BarnardPro Member
    Moderator
    Developer · Santa Clarita, CA · Member since 2008 · 15k+ posts · 10k+ votes
    16y
    Well said! :D
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  • Real Estate Investor · ten mile, TN · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 374 votes
    16y

    Josh, I would like to revisit the thought of negative voting.

    Can we do something that will not affect anyone's influence factor, but just vote down a post that is not good advice for someone to follow. This may be one way to identify (by popular negative vote count) something that should not be followed and not hurt the poster. Just speak to the content of the post itself.

    There may an misplaced negative vote now and then, but when there are many several negative votes to one post this would be an indication of wrong information, not just opinion negative vote.

    You could even require the negative poster to respond to what is wrong by also making the negative vote act the same as the "quote" button where they would then post what they feel is wrong with the quoted post that they are voting negatively about.

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y

    Interesting thought, Jim. Let me ponder it for a bit.

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  • Will BarnardPro Member
    Moderator
    Developer · Santa Clarita, CA · Member since 2008 · 15k+ posts · 10k+ votes
    16y

    My thought is that any "bad" or "wrong" information is usually identified and pointed out in reply posts. Having a negative vote does not really seem necessary to me.
    Just my opinion.

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  • Real Estate Investor · ten mile, TN · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 374 votes
    16y

    That is true, which is why I suggested that the vote also take you to the reply post which you are going to do anyway. The vote would only serve as a warning to the newbies not to consider what was posted. The rest of us will know better. The problem I see with it is that if the post is bad enough that it has to be removed then Jon or whoever removes it would also have to remove the reply post to keep the thread flowing smoothly.

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y

    I wanted to let everyone know that we updated the first post in the thread to make some minor changes to the influence scores. Additionally, we realized that we didn't show the points gained for successfully inviting your friends or colleagues to join up (upon their account activation), and for completing your profile, all of which are now included in the chart.

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  • Landlord · Seattle, WA · Member since 2010 · 3k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    16y

    An interesting way to encourage participation and interaction. I look forward to sharing and being a part of the community. It's great to have resources like this where investors can share what they know and give back something to the community.

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  • Indianapolis, IN · Member since 2009 · 16 posts · 0 votes
    16y

    I'm glad I found this post. I was wondering how the heck a person had negative influence. Now I'm wondering if I should've even contacted them (they had thousands of points in the negative for influence). Makes me leary now...If they can't even follow site rules, I hate to see how they run their business. Do you "ban" them at some point? Seems like a person that literally has a negative influence in the thousands isn't making the community any better. Just wondering...

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  • Investor, Entrepreneur, Educator · Springfield, MO · Member since 2009 · 21k+ posts · 12k+ votes
    16y

    Great system Josh! I agree with Will as far as negative posting. If there are comments that are incorrect members should post a reply to point it out. This encourages more participation and anyone can read the replies and decide for themselves. Having the ability to vote down a comment would likely result in many simply zapping posts for various reasons other than due to the content. So, just thinking, maybe we could vote down a comment, but only if we made a reply and the reply could be shaded to indicate that the party who replied next voted the previous post down. My thinking is that if you're going to disagree with someone, do it in the open and perhaps that will encourage those who disagree to justify their position.

    Chanda makes a very good point. My feling is that if someone doesn't follow the site rules (major stuff, maybe not the slight oversight type) it is an indication of how they operate. If they are willing to cheat at some level or ignore rules, I have to ask where else do they cheat, fudge, ignore rules or simply circumvent any system to advance their position? Bill

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y

    I'll say that after having the influence system for a while now, we certainly get a lot of people who jump on the site with a few minor mess-ups, resulting a a little negative influence. But as Chanda said, people with a large negative in the hundreds are typically those who are here to either SPAM, annoy other members, or they simply can't follow directions -- either way, it is a bad sign 99% of the time.

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  • Attorney · Raleigh, NC · Member since 2008 · 4k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    16y

    Agreed Josh. I have no problem with how it's working.

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  • Real Estate Investor · ten mile, TN · Member since 2009 · 1k+ posts · 374 votes
    16y

    I want to add that there will be several out there who will not realize through "many" types of one time considerations; such a medical influences, ect. There are not the ones to be concerned with in the overall grand scehme of thing.

    I Certainly hope that this will not be my last post on here, but have had to cut my support of Josh's Site (Donor wise) until things imporve.

    Josh if this is deemed in the wrong area please move it (or part of it) approiately for me.

    Thanks for all you have done and continue to do, JIM.

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y

    Don't sweat it, Jim. As you know, we're pulling for you.

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  • Developer · Garland, TX · Member since 2008 · 8k+ posts · 4k+ votes
    16y

    I've noticed in the past couple of months that I don't get any points for voting. Have I used up my lifetime quota?

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y

    Nope, Jon. We changed the algorithm a few weeks back because people were abusing it, as they always try to do.

    Members can still vote, but will no longer gain influence by doing so. On the other hand, if your forum posts are voted up, you will still reap the rewards of influence.

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  • Developer · Garland, TX · Member since 2008 · 8k+ posts · 4k+ votes
    16y

    Gotcha, most every system can be or will be gamed. Try coming up with a game-proof sales commission plan. :D We love games, especially when there is a score keeper.

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  • Landlord · Seattle, WA · Member since 2010 · 3k+ posts · 1k+ votes
    16y

    I see voting as a way to give credit to others here for adding value. So, if the one voting receives no credit that probably is better anyway.

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  • Joshua D.Pro Member
    OP
    BiggerPockets Founder · HI · Member since 2008 · 16k+ posts · 5k+ votes
    16y
    Originally posted by Charles Perkins:
    I see voting as a way to give credit to others here for adding value. So, if the one voting receives no credit that probably is better anyway.


    I couldn't have put it better myself.
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