[TenPercenter]

This forum is to post pictures of, ask advice about, talk about materials for, and otherwise discuss poker tables.

It is not to be used for selling services, selling tables, selling parts/cloth, or any other profit generating purposes. For selling anything poker related, there are two choices: The Classifieds for personal sales, and the Advertising choices for commercial sales.

These rules are site-wide and are not new. The Tables forum recently needed extra attention because the mods are frequently having to warn vendors and move threads off line.

The following is what mods tell vendors who are promoting their products or services. It applies to all products and services, not just tables.

Thanks.

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The simple rule for commercial interested parties is: "You cannot link to, inform about, or otherwise promote you own products or services unless you meet one simple criterion: You may answer a DIRECT question to you or your company with a DIRECT answer."

With that in mind, you are FREE to post as a "member" and enthusiast! Just not to sell your stuff. Your best bet is to post often, with meaningful, helpful posts! Take the seller's hat off, and put on the enthusiasts' hat. If a member asks a question that you know the answer to... answer them instead of trying to sell them something.


Here's a real world example and choices you could make, good and bad:

A Member posts, "Guys help me out, should I cover my poker table with plain cloth from the fabric store or speed cloth?"

Bad answer: "What size is the table? We have custom cloths starting at $193.49 for ChipTalk.net members."

Good answer: "Fabric store cloth, while cheaper by far, will wear out faster and cause you to spend time/effort re-covering more often. It is also common to "shed" on your guests' clothing. Speed cloth will cost more but you will avoid those issues (cards slide better on it too!)."


In the second reply, the seller is "helping" with expert advice, but NOT trying to directly sell the guy something. That approach, in time, will ingratiate the members to you... and you will benefit indirectly just by being a helpful guy.


Another example: Always remember that the rule is that you can only post info about your products/prices ONLY when it is the DIRECT answer to a DIRECT question.

Example:

Acceptable:
Question: "Fred [owner of SomeCompany], can you tell me how tall your Cherry Stained Oval table is and what is the up-charge for the drawers?"
Answer: "Sure John, that table is 36" high at the underside, and the drawers cost $200 retail, but we can offer ChipTalk members a 10% discount."

Not Acceptable:
Question: "Hey does anyone know where I can get a 36" tall Cherry Stained Oval table with drawers?"
Answer: "Sure John, [SomeCompany] has that table, and we can give ChipTalk members a 10% discount."

In the 2nd example, he was NOT answering a direct question with a direct answer.

If you have any question please let me know!

[AllinPokerCloth]

So basically you are saying anyone who builds tables and sells them which is almost everyone on the site cannot post the pictures of the finished products. Sounds like a joke to me IMO>

What is so wrong with posting pictures of the finished projects if you only say: "Here is a table I just finished"?

[palmimports]

Originally Posted by AllinPokerCloth

So basically you are saying anyone who builds tables and sells them which is almost everyone on the site cannot post the pictures of the finished products. Sounds like a joke to me IMO>

What is so wrong with posting pictures of the finished projects if you only say: "Here is a table I just finished"?

IVe been down this path before so let me make a comment- its difficult for a member who is a manufacturer or retailer etc to act as a member without the inference of product endorsement- in other words- its tough to comment on tables or post pics of your table IF you make and sell tables etc... EVEN if you are ONLY doing just that. It would be the same as if I posted pics of ceramic chips I just made ( which I sell ) because I am not acting entirely as a member at that point- even though I might be. If I didnt sell/make chips it would be fine... but I do-- so it isnt.

Ive argued this with CT and it took a long while to understand what they want to maintain. Its even difficult IF youre a sponser trying to maintain a somewhat unbiased stance-- you will definately be hammered from time to time form members and mods.

I'm not sure if youre a sponser- but if youre not its a good avenue to go-- it allows you alot of freedon albeit in your own forum. Even being a sponser doesnt allow you to venture outside your arena and post anything that can even remotely be construed as a gesture of sale.

Joe<>

[TenPercenter]

Originally Posted by AllinPokerCloth

So basically you are saying anyone who builds tables and sells them ... cannot post the pictures of the finished products.

That's right. Please refer to the original post or any of the numerous emails, PM's or phone conversations you and I have had. If it has been made unclear anyone please let us know and we'll edit the post above.

Like I've mentioned to you multiple times to you, we have only a few active mods here, and over half a million posts. We catch a lot... but will never catch everything. We reply upon the members to report any posts, and they do quite often (thank you!).

The tables forum doesn't get as much attention because we are primarily Chip geeks, and we don't read as many table posts as we do chip posts. We will try to spend more time keeping up with the posts in this forum in order to protect the investment that paying Sponsors signed up for. You'll notice that we have in the past had several table sponsors, but currently have NONE. If I were a table seller, I would not see the benefit of sponsoring if other "for profit" builders were allowed to promote right in the public forums.

Like we've already told many sellers privately, we are considering everything before today a warning, and a warning only. If continued refusal to adhere to policy occurs, we will simply have to part company.

[bigmike]

I'm not sure if its my place to stick my nose in here but as (an admittedly new) member here I have no problem with sponsors posting information about their products. Now I understand that advertising revenue is what makes this site run, so why not a compromise?

If a sponsor has a paid sponsor forum, or classified ad on this site, is it okay for them to refer to that in these threads?

Example:

bigmike: Hey guys, what are some recommended cloths to use for building your own poker table?
Sponsor: We sell speed cloth in our forum at chiptalk.net/sponsorsforum they're way better than using cheap felt.

This seems like a win-win-win. The user's get informed about what products are out there, paid sponsors gets good value for their advertising and thus will be more likely to continue supporting CT with advertising revenue.