On reducing spam created by service teams

[alice]

My suggestion aims to provide a solution for Mick's response here:

My understanding is that a lot of people dislike these teams because they copy/paste responses onto threads. If someone can come up with a good solution to prevent service teams and freelancers from posting their messages, then please create a suggestion for that because I believe that is what people think the real problem is.

The fix to reducing spam created by service teams is very simple. Only allow the service teams to advertise their service on the thread if they have already found a freelancer willing to tackle on the project.

Currently, service teams just spam their service everywhere because there might be a designer or a programmer in their team willing to tackle on the project, but many times there isn't. They don't know. They first want the user to join their server, open a ticket, see if any freelancer accepts it, etc.

Instead, the process should go like this:
Service team creates an alert on their server with the thread's details --> a freelancer accepts the project --> THEN the service team posts their Discord invite link, or even the freelancer's contact information on the thread

So a service team would serve more as a customer-finding service for freelancers, and they'd only be allowed to post if they have already found a freelancer on their end. Otherwise, they are just spam posting everywhere for no reason even though no one in their service team might even want anything to do with the thread.

 

[Mick]

How would we enforce this?

 

[rayzo]

I agree 100% with this thread. So many times I've created a thread requesting services. I lay out exactly what I'm looking for and sure enough, along comes a service team with their Discord invite. I foolishly join and am promptly put into contact with their "most qualified freelance agent," only for them to say that they don't do the kind of specific work I'm requesting.

Great suggestion alice

 

[alice]

I agree 100% with this thread. So many times I've created a thread requesting services. I lay out exactly what I'm looking for and sure enough, along comes a service team with their Discord invite. I foolishly join and am promptly put into contact with their "most qualified freelance agent," only for them to say that they don't do the kind of specific work I'm requesting.

Great suggestion alice

Thanks, I'm glad to hear that my suggestion would at least be enforceable in scenarios like this where you exactly lay out the details of what you need in the thread, and service teams still spam their Discord invite despite not having any confirmed freelancers who can handle the project.

A history of the service team spamming their invite everywhere, in combination with a user report or two describing a situation similar to yours, should be more than enough to get their service team suspended from McM, at least temporarily.

 

[Jenss]

I like this idea but I don’t think it’s gonna work. Spamming on the threads isn’t allowed either so giving warning points might be the best idea.

 

[oflords]

Extending off the idea of "freelance agency uses thread as a job for offer then replies if someone is going to do the work" could be getting the actual freelancer to start the communication. Something like

"Hey! I work for MCM Development Services and would be willing to accept this task! Please join our discord and reference this thread link in a ticket and you will be put straight through to me!"

Might be counter-productive for the person running it to get the services out there but also has the upside of stopping MCM banned users from using dev services to get work while still being banned.

TL;DR: Blanket ban on dev services posting but allowing the freelancer to reply referencing the dev service if they are willing to do it.

 

[Mick]

Extending off the idea of "freelance agency uses thread as a job for offer then replies if someone is going to do the work" could be getting the actual freelancer to start the communication. Something like

"Hey! I work for MCM Development Services and would be willing to accept this task! Please join our discord and reference this thread link in a ticket and you will be put straight through to me!"

Might be counter-productive for the person running it to get the services out there but also has the upside of stopping MCM banned users from using dev services to get work while still being banned.

TL;DR: Blanket ban on dev services posting but allowing the freelancer to reply referencing the dev service if they are willing to do it.

I think that the major appeal of being a part of a service team as a designer/developer is so that you don't have to do all of that by yourself, and it is the responsibility of managers of the team that you're a part of to contact potential clients to get them to join in.

 

[bt2S5NpQVjX9yGNKJ]

I think that the major appeal of being a part of a service team as a designer/developer is so that you don't have to do all of that by yourself, and it is the responsibility of managers of the team that you're a part of to contact potential clients to get them to join in.

I can just put my input here and tell Mick that his statement is correct, a major part of being on a service team is that you never have to do the work yourself, so it’s hard to tell who to side with in this suggestion.

I think that people are mad that service teams responses are just robotic at best. And that service teams will do anything to protect their asses against scam reports, look at Masons Monarch for example. The dude clearly has scammed people and has various scam reports against him, but for the benefit of the doubt, he is trying to repay people but I’m not sure how true or how possible that is. Anyways, Avira definitely stopped a majority of scam reports against him from being posted.

 

[Joshua C]

https://www.mc-market.org/threads/538270/
This is my thread where I stated some stuff relating to service teams, following these type of issues.

I agree 100% with this thread. So many times I've created a thread requesting services. I lay out exactly what I'm looking for and sure enough, along comes a service team with their Discord invite. I foolishly join and am promptly put into contact with their "most qualified freelance agent," only for them to say that they don't do the kind of specific work I'm requesting.

Great suggestion alice

90% of the service teams act like a business, despite not being a legal entity, which is cause #1.
Cause #2 stands they're not following the original MCM rules, if you can make verified sections for hosts, then you should also do the same for service teams to avoid spam and thousands of threads made by them in each section for different purposes.

To me I feel like the only solution to this was to implement a rule, where the OP would mention "No service teams", "Freelancers only" or something similar, but I believe this is already a part of the rules.
The only way to stop spam from them is.

Spoiler: The solution

Enforce the service teams to be only operatable on A BUSINESS ACCOUNT and not personal accounts.
During the creation of the business account, ask what purpose it is for giving them an option (Service Team) if they select that, they get a role attached saying "Service Team"

Now following that new rank added, in our profile preferences, you can add an option to disable "Service Teams"
Such as

If you chose to disable it then it would work like this, if you have this checked then the rank/role "Service Team" are not able to either PM you, or write a message on your thread.

Or at the creation of a thread, you can add an option to say "Enable Service Teams?" if checked, this would allow service teams to respond to the thread.

This seems more clear by all.

And in case let's say if a service team "Ranked" account tries to comment, or contact he can get this option

 

[901cosmic]

Why not just create a new role that'd be called "Sales Representative", and they'd be able to send a "proposal" to each client they find, through a new system, it'd almost be like a conversation, but instead we'd call it a proposal, that way no spam would happen on threads, yet clients would be informed in a non-harmful way.

 

[Shadow]

The way to fix this is to make a rule against the ticket discord thing. If someone makes post a team member should reach out to them and talk to them, not just have the team member direct you to a discord server.

 

[Severingcastle8]

I think possibly just make a category called "Services Team" and they can only advertise there and if people are wanting to deal with a service team they can look for one...

 

[901cosmic]

I think possibly just make a category called "Services Team" and they can only advertise there and if people are wanting to deal with a service team they can look for one...

No that defeats the purpose, of having sales representatives.[DOUBLEPOST=1577438523][/DOUBLEPOST]We all should be looking for new alternatives not just a single alternative that way we can create a system for service teams.