Can We Talk about All of The Lenovo Deals?

BluBoy on 21/03/2017 - 16:31

Can we talk about the number of Lenovo website deals posted on here?

So far for 2017, we are averaging 10 lenovo.com deals per month (and I would estimate that during the last quarter of 2016 this rate was even higher due to the sales season!)
In addition to this, there are numerous Lenovo laptop deals from other sites, such as eBay and Harvey Norman.

It appears to me that certain admin/moderators have a financial relationship with lenovo.com for the promotion of their laptops or referrals from this website.
Whilst, I have nothing against this (you guys need to make coin to keep the site running), it is starting to get a bit much and the website is starting to feel a bit like a Lenovo catalogue.

  • Can you openly discuss the relationships you have with Lenovo and the benefits you receive from them?
  • Can we limit the number of Lenovo 'bargains'.
    • While I admit that in general, Lenovo offer fantastic value… When the deals are happening every 3 days, this should be considered their standard price!

Cheers

Site Discussion

Comments

  • Moderatorneil on 21/03/2017 - 16:38

    Please see my post about among other things conspiracy theories.

    OzBargain is a 100% independent site. There is no financial relationship with any company including Lenovo.

    *or Gearbest or Cashrewards or any other mentioned.

    Stats for Lenovo Posts:

    Year Month Deals Posted
    2016 3 6
    2016 4 1
    2016 5 2
    2016 6 9
    2016 7 5
    2016 8 7
    2016 9 6
    2016 10 13
    2016 11 18
    2016 12 12
    2017 1 10
    2017 2 11
    2017 3 6

    EDIT:

    All deals:

    Year Month Deals Posted
    2016 3 2571
    2016 4 2436
    2016 5 2728
    2016 6 2781
    2016 7 2203
    2016 8 2326
    2016 9 2534
    2016 10 2440
    2016 11 3350
    2016 12 3055
    2017 1 2344
    2017 2 2047
    2017 3 1683

    So for February Lenovo deals comprised of .5% of all deals.

    Can we limit the number of Lenovo 'bargains'.

    Yes, hit the hide button.

    hide

    • BluBoy on 21/03/2017 - 16:54
      -3

      I would say Lenovo.com (a site that sells laptops) is very different to gearbest (a site that sells just about everything).
      Also, the majority of deals posted for lenovo.com in the last 6 months have been by admins/moderators.

      Again, there is nothing wrong with senior members of this website from collecting deals for the community. But could they follow the rules and be upfront about their relationship and involvement?

      My second issue, is that this website is becoming flooded with lenovo.com 'bargains'.
      You have confirmed over 70 posts in less than 6 months for the lenovo.com website alone.
      We have seen stores warned/blocked/banned for posting far fewer 'ads' for promoting their standard pricing.
      Even in the best case scenario, lenovo.com is taking advantage of and gaming the ozbargain system for their own advertisement.

      • ThithLord on 21/03/2017 - 17:09
        +3

        OzBargain is a 100% independent site. There is no financial relationship with any company including Lenovo.

        He told you.

        Go make your own deals website if this is too difficult to comprehend.

      • Moderatorneil on 21/03/2017 - 17:16

        Again, there is no financial relationship between moderators or any staff and Lenovo (or any other store). Lots of people send us deals. If they are good, they get posted. If they aren't good, we either ignore it OR they get posted in the anonymous deals thread. So I'll repeat, OzBargain is an independent site so please don't pass off conspiracy theories here.

        Yes 70/14919 which is .4% of all deals. I wouldn't call that a flood.

        Lenovo ranks 32 on amount of deals posted from the past 6 months:

        Full list

        Store # of deals
        amazon.com 417
        thegoodguys.com.au 347
        jbhifi.com.au 325
        woolworths.com.au 319
        harveynorman.com.au 295
        coles.com.au 251
        bigw.com.au 225
        target.com.au 223
        myer.com.au 159
        danmurphys.com.au 151
        supercheapauto.com.au 146
        gearbest.com 137
        bunnings.com.au 131
        officeworks.com.au 124
        binglee.com.au 121
        catchoftheday.com.au 117
        playstation.com 116
        ebgames.com.au 116
        amazon.co.uk 115
        aldi.com.au 111
        iwantthatflight.com.au 110
        dominos.com.au 103
        groupon.com.au 98
        ebay.com.au 89
        dicksmith.com.au 87
        microsoft.com 86
        cdkeys.com 86
        banggood.com 85
        shoppingexpress.com.au 77
        kmart.com.au 75
        costco.com.au 72
        lenovo.com 72
        geekbuying.com 72
        steampowered.com 69
        msy.com.au 69

        P.S. I'm currently working on the Zeitgeist for 2016 (which is why I have stats!) so you can read the whole report soon. And of course, stats from last month.

        • BluBoy on 21/03/2017 - 18:28

          there is no financial relationship between moderators or any staff and Lenovo (or any other store).

          This answers the first part of my question perfectly.
          Hopefully you can see, that with frequent posts by senior members of this website (especially ones whereby codes align closely with their name), it may have appeared otherwise.

          And again, I had no issue with OzB having a relationship with companies like this, but if there were any kickbacks, they should have been announced as per the rules.
          I accept that no money, favours or agreements were exchanged for their prominence here by senior members.

          Yes 70/14919 which is .4% of all deals. I wouldn't call that a flood.

          While not elegantly stated, I wasn't concerned with the exact number of deals, but rather the frequency in which they were posted by senior members from this year alone (~10 by Scotty alone so far this year, about 1 in 3 of his deals are from lenovo.com, plus about 8 from tightarse… But he is a posting machine, so meh)
          As per above, you've made it clear that this was solely as a benefit to the community. I also concede that the number of upvotes show that these posts are appreciated by the community too.

          P.S. I'm currently working on the Zeitgeist(blog.ozbargain.com.au) for 2016 (which is why I have stats!) so you can read the whole report soon.

          I know this is a lot of work, but thanks! I always enjoy reading the annual stats!

        • [Deactivated] on 21/03/2017 - 19:03

          @BluBoy: I have just read what scotty has posted, below. I will let him pick apart what I am just about to write. I am happy for him to do so, given that I must be misguided as to possible other motivations that might be at play, maybe, occasionally. I am definitely a laissez-faire ozbargainer, so, you know, anything is possible as regards current situation.

          Affiliate links pay part of OzBargain's way in the world. There are threads here and elsewhere that will explain why certain deals may be seen to cycle with at least some (still modest) frequency, where otherwise they might not, maybe, at all - www.google.com.au/search?q=ozbargain+lenovo+affiliate+links+… I'm sure that there have been genuine bargains in play with anything scotty has posted as relates Lenovo.

          Scotty is judicious and doesn't go overboard on OzBargain, where he very easily could. Compare to any number of owned websites - or individuals who link stuff on the wider internet, if you doubt that. e.g. YouTube is an affiliate-link free-for-all.

          Personally, I think that a principled stand against Lenovo, in particular, would have been a perfectly reasonable position to take, given the appalling, but there are people who like and continue to use their gear. Even some who would be well aware of the company's BIOS-deep inclinations.

        • spackbace on 21/03/2017 - 19:34
          +3

          @Tas:

          Affiliate links are what pay for other deal sites (HUKD, Slickdeals, etc) and no one would really care if they were in play on here. What I do object to is any allegation that this is the primary reason for posting certain deals, leaving deals up etc.

          If you look at either of those major sites I mentioned, certain front-page deals are left on the front-page for days, if not weeks, for maximum exposure. Reason being - to maximise affiliate commission.

          Deals here front-page and stay by the community involvement, nothing more nothing less.

          If scotty (for example) was to post a crappy deal just supposedly for affiliate commission, it would be shown to be a shit deal, and no one would click through.

        • Clear on 21/03/2017 - 20:20
          +1

          @Spackbace:

          If you look at either of those major sites I mentioned, certain front-page deals are left on the front-page for days, if not weeks, for maximum exposure. Reason being - to maximise affiliate commission.

          It's worse than that. Many ask stores for bribes to post and I know of some that even ask for 3 figure payments each month. OzBargain does none of that to store reps.

        • [Deactivated] on 21/03/2017 - 20:51

          @Spackbace:

          Appreciate all of that, although last point doesn't hold true, often and even on OzBargain.

          People will click-through and buy all manner of things on promise/assumption of best deal at given point, whether true or not. A heightened chance if the poster of the deal is known and trusted. Begosh and Begorrah, people have even been known to click links and buy things that they don't actually need.

          BluBoy a little headstrong, but in quest for knowledge. No mention at all in this thread of affiliate links, was a little problematic, I thought.

          Reference to Lenovo bastardry, just a lovely bit of bonus info for those unaware.

    • peterpeterpumpkin on 21/03/2017 - 23:15

      Without sounding like a conspiracy theorist myself, it's probably reasonable to assume that undetected sockpuppeting occurs despite OzBargain's careful and of course competent ;) moderation. The sockpuppeting tasks on Airtasker are often surprisingly overt but it would be very easy to have your long-term OzBargainer friends in the real world post deals on OzBargain or up-vote certain deals to help reach the front page (the ultimate vote-trigger).

      You can't use the least voted-on deals to reveal sockpuppets since many of us vote reflexively as a form of appreciation, as in "if I don't vote for the meh deals now he/she might not come back with the great deals next time". And then we have the category fetishists (travel, fast food, computers etc). That's right, I can read y'all like a book.

      • spackbace on 21/03/2017 - 23:54

        Nothing's perfect, and sometimes it comes down to good ole fashioned detective work :)

        I am very happy with the transparency on here though, other deal sites have obvious reps post and it goes under the radar, and the sites admin generally don't care. More deals published = more click-throughs. Thankfully this site is big enough it doesn't need those tactics.

        Oh and this book is a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure lol

  • railspider on 21/03/2017 - 17:11
    +5

    The Lenovo deals are upvoted because a lot of users consider them bargains. If they weren't good prices, people wouldn't upvote, and you wouldn't see the deal.

    Blame other manufacturers for not offering coupons/deals as often as Lenovo!

    • Moderatorneil on 21/03/2017 - 17:23

      True,

      Dell had 55 deals posted in the past 6 months. HP only 8.

    • teasatotalling on 22/03/2017 - 07:41

      Spot on mate.
      No wonder Lenovo are doing so well - the others are ham fisted.

  • try2bhelpful on 21/03/2017 - 17:24
    +3

    The OP is making some pretty big accusations and, I would suspect, there is absolutely no substance to them. Sounds a tad Donald Trump conspiracy theory to me. A number of people, myself included, are on the Lenovo mailing list and they do send out emails regularly. I don't post my Lenovo deals because I get a special discount rate through my work - which, I assume, other people may not. My suggestion to the OP is to apologise and we can all get on with our lives.

    • teasatotalling on 22/03/2017 - 07:45

      Like Donald, it's probably to divert attention from shady dealings.

      What Russian discount site is BluBoy in cahoots with?

      • try2bhelpful on 22/03/2017 - 09:22

        OP probably has shares in Apple or HP.

        • BluBoy on 22/03/2017 - 10:43

          Puh-lease… I'm on Sony type of guy :)

        • try2bhelpful on 22/03/2017 - 15:31

          @BluBoy: I cooked the hard drive on my last Sony. Can you please have a talk to quality control about their product :)

          Seriously though, there are a lot of deals that come through and, sometimes, it looks like the somebody is playing "favourites" but they rarely are. Lenovo does tend to send out a lot of emails and people put them up here if they think they might be worthwhile - questioning someone's integrity is not polite, particularly if you have no actual proof. (Hence my allusions to Donald Trump). I would've reworded the original posting to ask why there seemed to be so many Lenovo deals; rather than questioning if there was some sort of collusion going on.

        • [Deactivated] on 22/03/2017 - 20:32

          @try2bhelpful:

          I don't put any of this in the same category as undeclared advertorial content meshed with affiliate links (at bare minimum). That promo/funding model is everywhere on The Internet, vague laws in at least some places be damned.

          OP did write: "It appears.." and appearances do count.

          Neil and Scotty did go to considerable lengths to imply - by omission (is that possible? could be) that no extra financial benefit at all - beyond normal web traffic/ad impressions, would accrue for OzBargain when certain regularly posted deals appear on the website.

          There is an additional benefit for the website, by way of affiliate commission, when some deals are posted. A clear incentive, whether acted upon with increased frequency of posting those deals, or not.

          Either way, skipping past or excluding deals are both easy to do on OzBargain. Virtues of the website.

        • Moderatorneil on 22/03/2017 - 21:01

          @Tas:

          Neil and Scotty did go to considerable lengths to imply - by omission

          Eh? We could write volumes about loads of related issues. But if you asked we would point you to this help page:

          Affiliation Links on OzBargain

          Easy way to test which stores are serving affiliate links to guests (never members) and which don't is to open the tab in incognito mode (or logout).

          • Lenovo deals, (e.g. this deal or this deal) currently don't have affiliate links at all.

          • Dell deals, (e.g. this deal have affiliate links served to guests (which you can pick to use or not).

          All logged in users will only be served clean links. Only guests (non-logged in users) will get affiliate links.

        • [Deactivated] on 22/03/2017 - 21:42

          @neil:
          Neil, at the level OzBargain involves itself with affiliate commission, I'm truly not the least bit fussed and am actually happy to see some extra dosh coming in for the website.

          No mention at all of the presence of some affiliate links being present on the site - with explanation, clarification - was an oversight, I figured, given the nature of OP's attempted Inquisition…

          All good now and definitely 'non-Spanish', by me…
          :)

          Have a good night.

  • spackbace on 21/03/2017 - 17:39
    -1

    Sigh

  • stargalaxy on 21/03/2017 - 17:42

    From the above stats, I will not says that the site is flooded with Lenovo deals. Ozbargainers are all smart and will only buys if it is a bargain, so even if Lenovo post 1000 deals a day, if it is not good price, nobody will buy.

  • Moderatorscotty on 21/03/2017 - 17:52

    Top poster for Lenovo here, and also the site admin. A few reasons why there appears to be many Lenovo deals:

    • I buy and use Lenovo products. Actually I buy Lenovo laptops for all the staffs working for OzBargain because I like their stuff and they are cheaper comparing to equivalent business laptops from Dell (T/X-series verses Latitude for example).

    • Lenovo also markets aggressively, and are more willing to cut price & provide special coupon code (when they need to meet their monthly quota I guess?)

    Their biggest competitor for business laptops is probably Dell (which I also happen to be the top poster, as prior to 2011 I worked for a company that use exclusive Dell hardware). I'll post more Dell deals if they send out more promotions :) However in terms of monthly Dell deals (comparing with neil's table):

    Year Month Deals
    2016 3 8
    2016 4 4
    2016 5 6
    2016 6 11
    2016 7 16
    2016 8 12
    2016 9 7
    2016 10 9
    2016 11 11
    2016 12 5
    2017 1 7
    2017 2 11
    2017 3 10

    It's actually not too much different comparing to Lenovo's.

  • ozhunter on 21/03/2017 - 18:58

    Can we talk about

    Sounds like a youtube comment lol.

    • neil on 21/03/2017 - 19:34
      +1

      Here in my garage, just bought this new Lenovo here…

  • nubzy on 21/03/2017 - 20:01

    Keep them coming I say!! Good to see, but I just wish we could get some ground breaking OzBargain deal on the X or T series laptops. I am still so annoyed I missed that 1k T460S deal a few months ago. I am not interested in the cheap consumer models that keep getting posted, whilst they may be cheap for the specs offered I don't think they will last long term and Lenovo is known to use crappy screens in their consumer lines, the X series get a better screen + materials/lighter. Thought I had snagged a X1 Carbon G4 for $650 from Grays until they ran out of stock.. would be great if Lenovo can get us a deal on that close to their price.

    • tebbybabes on 21/03/2017 - 21:15

      There was a 1k T460s deal???? faints

  • Yummy on 21/03/2017 - 20:36
    +1

    "harveynorman.com.au 295" (#5 in OZB and he is still whingeing)

    Can we ban Gerry plz? kthxbai. :p

  • altomic on 21/03/2017 - 22:58
    +3

    OH MY GOD - there were 417 deals for amazon.com !!!

    certain admin/moderators must have a financial relationship with lenovo.com amazon.com for the promotion of their laptops products or referrals from this website.

  • Looking4Bargians on 22/03/2017 - 10:28

    I think what OP wants to say that Few deal posters seems to be affiliated to Lenovo as they use referral code linked to their name.

    He is happy to see Lenovo deals here which helps everyone but Deal Poster should use Store Affiliated tag while posting them as per OZB Rules & Conditions.

    No Harm to bring up this question in Forum ( In a healthy way) but the choice of the words and Tone used by OP seems to be a bit harsh on OZB Admins/Moderators.

    It is just my opinion on OP.

    • BluBoy on 22/03/2017 - 10:42

      I agree with all of this, especially the clumsy wording.

      • try2bhelpful on 22/03/2017 - 20:54

        I agree your original wording was clumsy.

        • BluBoy on 22/03/2017 - 21:02

          I would high five you, but we'd probably smack each other in the face.

        • try2bhelpful on 22/03/2017 - 21:03
          +1

          @BluBoy: probably would. I think we need to do this with fish, ala the monty python dance routine.

    • Moderatorneil on 22/03/2017 - 10:51

      There was a whole discussion on user negotiated deals.

      The short of the current guidelines:

      • Users asking companies for deals and then posting WITHOUT receiving a financial reward (money/freebie/store credit etc.) is fine.

      • If there is a financial reward OR the company is asking you to post on behalf of them (as this bypasses posting limits), then the user should mark as associated.

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