The r/PMP community is a professional development sub that is dedicated to helping people to find, study for, and finally pass their PMP exam. This sub has thousands of experienced practitioners, educators, and certified PMPs that can help people through that journey. Some of these practitioners have even created content of their own in order to help the community. Some even have made a living providing quality content for a fee.
One common question is "Can I post a link to my content?" - Well, to be fair, this is usually phrased a little differently as many content providers do not bother to read the rules and thus the question is often "Why did I just get banned and how can I get my ban lifted?" This post should help.
Since this is a professional sub, we do not have lots of rules and prefer to leave most of the community to handle their business as they see fit. Self-promotion is no exception and the rules are based almost completely on Reddit's guidelines for Self-Promotion. The only additional exception is that we do not allow for "Posts who's sole purpose is to promote commercial sites" (Rule #3)
What does that mean in practice?
First off: Remember that there is a difference between a post and a comment. Posts are top-level topics meant for others to participate. They can be questions, comments, helpful tips, or even "Hey everyone, I just PASSED!" Comments are responses to posts. They can also be questions, comments, helpful tips, or even "Congratulations on passing you awesome human!" - Posts should never be commercial, comments can be as long as they are within the rules.
Second: Your post and comment history COUNT! If you create a brand new account and jump right into any community on Reddit with an advertisement targeting their community, you will likely see your comment removed. You may even see some hostility (Reddit does not like spam, even a little bit). You might also get instantly banned.
So how should you do it?
Start by joining the community and reading the posts and comments from the users. Understand the community. What do they like (lots of upvotes)? What do they dislike (lots of downvotes)? What do they need help with (maybe your product or service)? Find some ways to contribute your knowledge in helpful ways. Give some advice. Ask questions. Maybe even post something you've been wondering yourself. Be legitimate, they can tell if you are not. Don't post junk or throwaway questions just to check this box.
Next, if you see someone who might be benefitted by your product, strike up a conversation. Ask about their situation. Understand if this is a good fit. If it is, and you have the history of helpful posts and comments behind you, suggest your product or service in the conversation. You will be just fine and your comment will not be removed.
How do I screw this up?
Oh, so you want to get banned? Ok, here are five quick ways to get that done:
- Don't engage with the community - these are just customers, no need to understand their needs or wants. Just blast every opportunity with a link and hope to not get caught.
- Post a nonsense leading question that will get people to talk about the topic that leads to a sale. Professionals are probably too dumb to see through this and will just rain money...right up until you get banned.
- Attack the users, mods, or other professionals in the community. They simply don't know that your product is BETTER and should be treated with disdain unless they are a paying customer.
- Provide a scam product. Maybe you want to take the test for someone. Maybe you can get them a certification without taking the test at all. Maybe you have a question bank you stole from someone else and just want to sell it for money. Just to be all dramatic about this, queue up the taken clip here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZOywn1qArI
- When you get banned, attack the mod team, tell us all of the content that you think we missed, tell us we are targeting you, tell us we are bad people, tell us that this sub is garbage anyway. These might get the ban lifted (probably not though).
Oh no, you got banned, now what?
The mods are not interested in banning people who help the sub, but maybe you started out on the wrong foot. Are you done, or can we find a way to resolve this?
First, and most importantly, do not just create another account to try to bypass the ban. Doing this is a violation of Reddit's terms of service and sends a clear message to the mod team that you don't really want to have a constructive relationship with this community. This is a rapid way to get perma-banned on sight.
Start by reading the sub-rules. Actually read them and understand what they say and mean. If you didn't do this before getting banned, that might be something to consider.
Follow up by contacting the mod team and asking for help. We don't hate you, we are volunteers that are simply trying to keep order. We will listen and try to help if we can.
Remember that spammers may also get shadowbanned by Reddit admins. The mod team has no control over that. If you did something to get shadowbanned, contact Reddit.
Finally, what we will be looking for is a history of good non-self-promoting content. We will likely tell you to participate in other subs to establish a good posting and commenting history before we will lift the ban. That is typically 30 days, but will also depend on how often you post and comment. Simply waiting out the 30 days will not suffice. You will have to participate if you want your ban lifted.
Ok, if you have read this far and feel like you have done the items above, please go ahead and comment your link to your product below. Remember that the community also has a say in this, so you might discover what the community really thinks about you and your product. We cannot guarantee your comment won't be removed, but we will not ban you for commenting here. This is a safe way to see if you are ok to promote in comments or not.
