Paid avatars indeed are annoying. I've been in a number of forum communities, and as some said before in this thread, i recognize the posters by their avatars more than their nicknames. I think it's like a part of your forum-personality. If you have paid avatars here, like many people do - you lack that feature, and thats a minus, to me at least.
I too look down on a few of the members doing it, but then I don't really blame them at times...as this is not their main site. Though, if they are selling out on their own forum, that's certainly a new level of low I do not mind product recognition avatars if the product belongs to the member though. As that just makes sense on some level...
I don't mind that either, but the situation goes beyond the owner of the website/service. You can see 40 people with the same avatar, and for what ? a few bucks ? How much do these people pay to have users put these ad-avatars on in here ?
I never intend to rent my avatar and I even had some new ones created. But when I'm offer 25$ per month than I'm going to take the deal in a heart beat.
I guess that in each forum that i am interested in and register, i take it on abit higher personal level than alot of other regular users. I just like forums And i'd probably wouldn't change my avatar to an ad-avatar for 25$ a month.
Has anyone tracked a click on an Avatar, to a sales conversion??? Where does the marketing part come in?
I knew a girl who felt that same way with a part of her body bet you can't guess what her title is now??
I'm sure if you see on each post a certain ad-avatar, over and over again, all over the forums - you will have some positive or negative interest to check what the heck this fuss is all about. It's yet another simple ad, only small and in a forum avatar form. Edit: Lol at the post above ^
I dunno... I could completely pimp my account (sigs, avatar, location & blog) out for $25-$30 a month... which would certainly pay for my hosting I'll not do that though, heh, at least not completely. _________ As for 40 people with the same avatar though, there are a few sites out there I've never noticed a link for, but if I do spot one, I'll associate it with the avatars I've seen for it. YAY 4 Product recognition! (it's like watching TV commercials on MUTE)
Thanks for the laugh hehehe As for avatars I see them but never have felt inclined to click.....besides it's not going to take me anywhere but to the profile page here which I can get to in other methods..
Believe it or not, there are some people who actually type the address in their browser and check it out. That's what these avatars for. It isn't meant for the experienced users/webmasters who know better than that.
I often check out the poster's profile if they have a beautiful or creative design IMO. I don't usually check out people's avatar when they do a great post.. i click their signatures instead
Personally I find I associate an avatar to the general quality of the users posts. I always look at the avatar, we all do, and when I see a really good post it sticks in my head. So the next time I see that avatar I am already conditioned into thinking the post is going to be good. The bright ones stand out to me the most and if you do spend time on DP and contribute quality posts and you have an online business then it is worth using your avatar as a marketing avenue. And as far as actually counting/tracking visits to my profile and then to my site I often see clicks coming through to my site from my profile. Obviously I can't tell if they came to my profile from my avatar but I am guessing most would.
Personally I really remember the avatars that have a human face. Man or woman. I get a bit annoyed when a friendly picture turns out to have an unfriendly behavior behind it, but well, that's life. I like snoopy and other cartoons as well. I also get annoyed at seeing threads with most people posting having the same avatar. I'm very glad to see those times are over. And my avatar is not for sale. [nor is any part of my body - yes, I'm a girl]
You got good point .. full pink background of avatar on light green theme of dp really becomes eye catchy at least for once