@kitti what are you referring to specifically? We operate with the highest level of integrity and if we’re not we’d like to fix it immediately. Please do let us know…
The Affiliate Links App is part of our Monetization offerings that helps make *you* money. Can be toggled on/off at any time (instructions). Your Earnings reports are under /earnings in your Shareaholic Dashboard.
Thread Starter
Kitti
(@skullberry)
@shareaholic The biggest issue I have are the “related posts” advertisements linking AWAY from my site to who-knows-where. That is NOT acceptable under any circumstance.
The only referrals and redirects I want to give are for articles on sites I personally have thoroughly researched and can genuinely vouch for. This is my reputation on the line here.
Offering a free plugin doesn’t give you license to plaster your logo on every corner where it’s used and insert advertisements at the soonest possible vacancy. I have a variety of plugins both paid and free and NONE of them are notable on the front end of my website; and this business with linking to outside content is vulgar and unheard of.
Those are the two primary reasons I scrambled to get rid of this thing as fast as I could; but thinking back now there were lots of other red flags I should have paid closer attention to.
For example, I’m not eligible for Amazon Affiliates, but even I was taken aback when I read about how this plugin “helps” with those who do, specifically with the links. You can try to spin this one any way you want but let’s call a spade a spade; this feature is NOT in the best interest of the website owner.
I have a feeling only a small handful of users are coming forward to vocalize their experiences in regards to this plugin; I almost didn’t leave a review myself – I’m sure there are MANY more out there who simply uninstalled and never looked back.
Hi Kitti,
Thank you for sharing details. Our goal is to always improve and I really appreciate it!
Promoted Content, the feature that adds links from content advertisers, is a monetization feature that makes money for you and has been part of the Related Content app for a while. That said, we try to design every feature of the platform to be 100% customizable to provide you with choices at every step. This holds true for each and every app – share buttons, follow buttons, etc. One can turned off / on Promoted Content at any time by following instructions here: http://support.shareaholic.com/hc/en-us/articles/202365395-Promoted-Content-How-to-turn-on-off
I 100% agree that the content being promoted needs and must be high quality. We hear you and we’ve been working hard on this. As part of our process, each and every piece of content that advertisers submit is hand curated and screened and must meet content guidelines. In addition, a site owner can also block individual ads and advertisers. If there is an ad that slipped through that should not have, please do let us know and we will take immediate action.
The Affiliate Links App is designed in close collaboration with a partner of ours called Viglink (we choose our partners very carefully – even Google is an investor in Viglink). We both do all the heavy lifting of getting approved, compliance, etc for various affiliate programs, so you don’t have to. We do this for each and every site. Here’s their FAQ about Amazon compliance and you can check any unpaid earning balances here.
We agree, we were not our best out of the gate! WE LISTENED, and we are so appreciative for the motivation and inspiration. Your choice to use or not use us is entirely your own, but we want to do everything we can to restore the faith!
