I don't worry that a customer will choose one of the 65 other offerings instead of mine
That is my mindset. As far back as last year I was posting screenshots that show that the "other products from this category" are usually designs completely unrelated to the main one the user clicked on from a link. Unless one is creating/promoting the same generic photo collage worlds-best-daddy I heart pugs type designs as on the cat landing pages, then those other designs pose no threat. It's the "other designs you might like" scroll of 25 products that one needs to worry about as those are usually extremely similar as they are pulled from tags. If you look at Carla's prescription label coffee mug, all 25 other designs in that scroll are just slightly different variations by other designers. But the "other products from this category" section, nothing there is even remotely similar to the prescription label design. There's zero threat there, especially if one is taking the much-given advice to do your own thing, find your own niche, instead of trying to compete with the trendy/popular front-page designs that already have a track record. So I have been failing to comprehend all the fuss being made in recent weeks over this. But
the issue I have is that if they choose one in addition to mine that I am not compensated for that. It was my work, my pin, my product that brought the customer there, and I am doing those pins to promote my own work to get the 35% self-promotion $, not to act as free advertising to 65 others!
that might finally explain it. It's not that one might be losing sales, its that they may be making sales for others without being compensated. Although I don't feel the same way I can understand now what's maybe triggering people. But, A) given the above it's unlikely IMO that it is resulting in sales of those totally dissimilar products and B) when using a promoter link one knows they are playing the odds, 15% on anything/everything or 35% if yours. It's a known gamble one voluntarily takes when using a promoter link. Those are the terms. So again I am left struggling to understand the fuss; if one is getting the 35% on their own product getting bought, then they met their goal, promotion was successful, so why care if they also bought something from another Creator?
I hit Reply on your post but am talking globally here as this has been such a common topic in the forums of late.
There's no "arguing" with feelings, people will feel what they feel and nothing will change that. I am more comfortable with facts & stats & hard data and that's something I feel has been missing from all the discussion on this.
So, @CreativeLeahG , you have been the biggest opponent of the "landing page" because you say it is luring people away from the product you are promoting in the hopes of earning that 35%, and you've been very free in posting screenshots of your personal stats. I'm not going to go back to try to find any specific one so I have a test for you that would provide some real stats. Since we know that if a person comes in on a PP2 link but buys something else, the Promoter gets a $0 referral that ups their total referral # but not total $'s, and since we know you do a load of referring with impressive link-over stats, here's what I propose:
Pick any upcoming day this week. After, look at your number of linkovers for that day. (We know you can't tell which were 15% and which were 35% links but it's enough.) Then look at your referral numbers to see how many $0 referrals you got that same day. That would show how many people came in on one of those links, got distracted, and bought something else. Compare this to how many Self-referrals you got same day for people buying your own stuff you were promoting. How do those totals compare to the each other and to the total number of link-overs for the day? You're only one person but an extremely active one with promoting & linkovers & referrals so some real numbers here might shed some light on all the hyperbole.
I can't post 0% referrals as I don't have an iPhone.
I'm not in the Promoter Program but it is my understanding (and someone will correct me if I am wrong) that these $0 referrals from someone coming in on your clean PP2 link but buying someone else's product increase your total # of referrals but they don't increase your total $ amount nor do they show in your Referral History. So if your total number of referrals increased by 10 but there's only 7 new ones itemized in your Referral History, then you'd know you had 3 ghost referrals that day. Since you've been saying that your referrals have dropped significantly to something like 1 or 2 a week, it shouldn't be too difficult to do a cross-check like this and then compare that total number of ghost referrals to the total number of linkovers for the day. Then we could see that out of say 1500 people who clicked on your links in a day, x many ignored your product and bought something from someone else.
There is no way for me to see ghost referrals Col, without the app.
This number (below) directly relates to the number of the referrals earned ie 166 pages with 25 results per page. So NO, ghost referrals do not accrue in the total figures. So, yes you are wrong.
You want to dispute what I am saying, carry on, it won't change anything. It is what it is. If I had the data from Zazzle like I requested I would share it as others already have!
I have requested my removal from the P2 program.
Yes. That's what I said. They are not recorded in the Referral History (which is what Leah's screenshot shows) but they increase the total number of All Referrals on the Referral Totals page.
There have been lots of mentions in the forums of people confused because their stats went up but they have nothing in history to show why and it comes back to being $0 referrals. That's why I am aware it's a thing. Some examples -
Back in May a Creator wrote
I am in the promoter prog and looking at the Referral Totals, I can see I have seven total pending, but the Referral History lists four as pending which means the other unlisted three will no doubt be the zero earning referrals you mention.
and another comment from June from a Silver level designer who does not have the iPhone app
To keep track of the $0 referrals I'm getting, I select the Filter "Only Cleared and Pending" in the Referral History report and compare that number (in my case, that's 86 results) to the Total Number of All Referrals (98) to the Referral Totals summary.
and this from just this month:
On my seller-end, @ColsCreations own product purchase through my promoter link got me 0% referral, the referral counts up in my referral summary (+1 referral, no earnings) but does NOT show up in my referral history (not even as 0% referral). So, basically, when you get a referral "sale" showing up in the summary but not in the history, it's a 0% referral.
It may not be as convenient as using the iPhone app, but this does show one can tell from their regular stats if they know what they are looking for.
Referrals can not be measured with the Linkover history because those are not guaranteed as referrals.
Exactly. They show how many people clicked on one of your referral links. And from your referral totals & history pages you can figure out how many of those clicks led to $0 ghost referrals to see how problematic (or not) they actually are. 5 out of 1500? 0.33%. 5 out of 20? 25%. ....
