38 replies to this topic

[.Ian]

No offence, but after 200+ posts here and several topics in this forum, I would have thought by now, you would have decided if IP.Board is for you or not.

It is a great product, but as with anything in life we have to make decisions. The more you ask, the greater the risk that you will talk yourself out of a great product.

[♥ Adam ♠]

PSNation, on 17 June 2011 - 08:27 AM, said:

Unless you confirm to me your purchase of these I do not see the need to

The whole point of a pre-sale forum is to find information before you purchase.  
Was not asking for a copy & paste of the topics.  Simply a "yes" or "no" to my question.

But if you are un-willing to help, I thank you for your time and wish you well.

[PSNation]

My final statement on this

If the support forum does not provide an answer which is rare then the IPS staff ALWAYS do

[Matt]

I've merged your topics.

Anyone can see the support forum exists
Anyone can see the forum index (the list of topics)
Only those with an active license can view the topic / reply to the topic / start a new topic.

[♥ Adam ♠]

PSNation, on 17 June 2011 - 08:34 AM, said:

My final statement on this

If the support forum does not provide an answer which is rare then the IPS staff ALWAYS do

Thank you.

That was all I wanted to know.  You have been very helpful.

[♥ Adam ♠]

Matt, on 17 June 2011 - 08:36 AM, said:

I've merged your topics.

Anyone can see the support forum exists
Anyone can see the forum index (the list of topics)
Only those with an active license can view the topic / reply to the topic / start a new topic.

Thank you for clearing this up. To my knowledge on 3.1, this was not so.  And if it was so, then maybe I was having an issue with my PC and was not aware until now.

[Kyanar]

The Visitors, on 17 June 2011 - 08:28 AM, said:

http://community.inv...39858-pre-sale/

I do not understand why my question was seen with such hostility. It was a valid questions and it was drawn from valid concerns.

0 replies + weeks / months + "X" amount of such topics = Pre-sale concerns

I was not trying to attack Invsion or put down anything. It was a valid point of view.


I have my answers. Thank you.

Except it kind of isn't valid.  The support forum is one of two main support resources available, and it sure aint the primary support method (which would be tickets).  And without seeing the content of a thread, you sure can't gauge whether it's something anyone could simply answer or not.  It's also not amazingly unique that there are unanswered support threads - I see those at XF and vB as well.

[Matt]

It's always been that way as far as I know. Either way, what you experience is the desired behaviour, so there's nothing to worry about.

The license fee entitles you to support via the client area. This is manned by our staff and you will get an answer in a timely fashion. The forums are a courtesy for those who wish to use them.

Edited by Matt, 17 June 2011 - 08:54 AM.
Clarified forum support conditions.

[♥ Adam ♠]

.Ian, on 17 June 2011 - 08:30 AM, said:

No offence, but after 200+ posts here and several topics in this forum, I would have thought by now, you would have decided if IP.Board is for you or not.

It is a great product, but as with anything in life we have to make decisions. The more you ask, the greater the risk that you will talk yourself out of a great product.

Actually as honestly as I can be... And again, I'm not trying to troll anyone....Just being honest..... The negativity and hostility could just as easily convince me not to buy Invsion.  Would you want to buy into a community where members were rude and un-willing to answer simple questions?!

This was actually to be my last question before purchasing.  Now I'm not sure.  Is this what I could expect every time I have a question or concern?

As for you my 200 post... I like to be very well informed, educated, and aware before making any purchase.  I think I had well over 400 post when I purchased vBulletin and the same for XenForo.  I'm not someone who rushes into making such choices.

But I respectfully understand we all see things differently.


edit: Kind of off topic, but funny is you should see how many question I make for buying a car.  I think I visited the dealer on & off for 6 months, test drove if 5x, and joined several online communities 6 months in advance to learn all I could.  When I was done... I could have fixed that car myself, before I had even bought it..... But that should give you the level of information I seek.

[.Ian]

The Visitors, on 17 June 2011 - 08:41 AM, said:

Actually as honestly as I can be... And again, I'm not trying to troll anyone....Just being honest..... The negativity and hostility could just as easily convince me not to buy Invsion.  Would you want to buy into a community where members were rude and un-willing to answer simple questions?!

This was actually to be my last question before purchasing.  Now I'm not sure.  Is this what I could expect every time I have a question or concern?

As for you my 200 post... I like to be very well informed, educated, and aware before making any purchase.  I think I had well over 400 post when I purchased vBulletin and the same for XenForo.  I'm not someone who rushes into making such choices.

But I respectfully understand we all see things differently.


edit: Kind of off topic, but funny is you should see how many question I make for buying a car.  I think I visited the dealer on & off for 6 months, test drove if 5x, and joined several online communities 6 months in advance to learn all I could.  When I was done... I could have fixed that car myself, before I had even bought it..... But that should give you the level of information I seek.

You will find that many members try and give the best possible answer where they can.  We are not always 100% correct, but try to be as helpful as possible. I have been involved in support forums for forums for 10+ years having been a moderator on another product. I can tell you that this forum is one of the better forums for any product - I can list you a hundred or so far worse!

I have an unanswered topic that I made very recently in the support forum - whilst it would be great to have a reply, it is not the end of the world. If replies are not forthcoming then simply put in a ticket - you will get a reply within a reasonable time frame from staff that know the product inside out. Okay - I didn't as I do not feel it is within the scope of the contract that I have with ISP, which probably applies to other topics from customers as well.

[Lindy]

Hello The Visitors:

I appreciate your interest and your performing your pre-purchase diligence.

I am the type of person that researches a large purchase endlessly (it drives me wife crazy) so I do understand to , however, we're not talking about buying a new home, or even a new car. It's a piece of software. IPS products have existed for nearly a decade, are proven and are used to power thousands of communities ranging from smallest to the most prominent. I'm not entirely sure what you're hoping to accomplish with dozens of "do you like .... ?" topics, confrontational inquiries, etc. but it seems to be approaching a line between genuine pre-sale curiosity and an attempt at stirring things up.

Try the demo. Read our feedback forums. Look at other communities that use us. Contact the sales department if you have any specific questions about our products and services. But, I think that your pre-sale research on the forums has reached a point where it's nearly become disruptive. If we're not the right solution for you, I'd certainly understand and encourage you to continue your search for the perfect solution with another vendor.

As an aside, the forums are not an adequate gauge of our level of support. Only 5% of our customer base even visit our forums and many issues cannot be addressed via the forums. Although our published ticket response times are 48 hours for non business licenses, I think you'll find most tickets are answered within a matter of a few hours, if not minutes in some cases.

Thank you again for your interest.

[Heyhoe]

In IPS defence, your initial topic was one of a negative nature, so your asking for negative replies.

If you decide to post a topic of such a provocative nature, without actually knowing all the details (ie only judging the topic by it's title and no replies... Can't judge a book by it's cover) then you are asking for a degree of negativity. Which has mostly come from customers and not the staff.

Also, if the situation is as bad as you make out, why has there been no posts backing up your concerns yet?..

I think this issue is best put to bed.

EDIT: maybe this is a little harsh as after reading the post again you were not "that" negative. But the point still stands.

[♥ Adam ♠]

Lindy, on 17 June 2011 - 09:10 AM, said:

Hello The Visitors:

I appreciate your interest and your performing your pre-purchase diligence.

I am the type of person that researches a large purchase endlessly (it drives me wife crazy) so I do understand to , however, we're not talking about buying a new home, or even a new car. It's a piece of software. IPS products have existed for nearly a decade, are proven and are used to power thousands of communities ranging from smallest to the most prominent. I'm not entirely sure what you're hoping to accomplish with dozens of "do you like .... ?" topics, confrontational inquiries, etc. but it seems to be approaching a line between genuine pre-sale curiosity and an attempt at stirring things up.

Try the demo. Read our feedback forums. Look at other communities that use us. Contact the sales department if you have any specific questions about our products and services. But, I think that your pre-sale research on the forums has reached a point where it's nearly become disruptive. If we're not the right solution for you, I'd certainly understand and encourage you to continue your search for the perfect solution with another vendor.

As an aside, the forums are not an adequate gauge of our level of support. Only 5% of our customer base even visit our forums and many issues cannot be addressed via the forums. Although our published ticket response times are 48 hours for non business licenses, I think you'll find most tickets are answered within a matter of a few hours, if not minutes in some cases.

Thank you again for your interest.

Thank you for your reply, Lindy.

I feel you have misjudge our inquires as the vast majority have not be "do you like..." questions, but rather questions concerning SEO, server usage, member users, traffic, modifications, Invision Policy, support, and statistics.  Along those lines we have sought out information on both opinions and facts, as we believe not everything can be fairly viewed by either.

Myself and others from within our community will continue to ask questions until we either believe Invision is right for us or until we believe it is not.  I feel we have done so in a respectful and in responsible manner.  We also do not believe we can fully be held accountable for the misinterpretations of our inquires, but will attempt to the best of our ability to improve our communications, in an attempt not to be misinterpreted.

Thank you and have a good day.

[Aisha]

So how many threads were merged into this one? I didn't even notice as I was reading through the thread until Matt said he'd merged a bunch of topics. :x

[Kessler]

The Visitors, on 17 June 2011 - 09:57 AM, said:

I feel you have misjudge our inquires as the vast majority have not be "do you like..." questions, but rather questions concerning SEO, server usage, member users, traffic, modifications, Invision Policy, support, and statistics.  Along those lines we have sought out information on both opinions and facts, as we believe not everything can be fairly viewed by either.

Myself and others from within our community will continue to ask questions until we either believe Invision is right for us or until we believe it is not.  I feel we have done so in a respectful and in responsible manner.  We also do not believe we can fully be held accountable for the misinterpretations of our inquires, but will attempt to the best of our ability to improve our communications, in an attempt not to be misinterpreted.

Something that can be considered annoying, spam like and even disruptive is to generate multiple "do you like" topics when one topic would suffice.  It also make a difference where you make the topic.   Asking in the feedback forum or even in the pre-sales forum is more appropriate than the general community talk forum.  It's better and even to your benefit to use one topic to address a "do you like" question for all the products you want to ask about instead of expecting people to open up several topics just to answer the same question just for different products.  Some may want to answer in detail about the integration but may not know which topic they should answer in and so decide to not bother.  That means less information for you on top of having to hunt down and read each topic.

I find it understandable to want to learn all you can about a product before making a purchase.  For those on a limited budget, it can seem like a huge investment.  Here is a good rule of thumb that I think makes good business sense - don't buy a product if it's not going to serve YOUR needs.  I personally feel that IP.Board is an excellent product, being more reliable and sturdier than other forum products available.  However, if one of the others suits your needs better, then that is where you should go.  I recall Charles making a post once where he said that he won't try to sell something to someone if he feels that it's not right for them.  It's the same idea.

Please keep in mind that perception is everything.  Your perception is your reality.  If you are perceived as being negative or a nuisance, then even if you have the best of intentions, it won't get a very positive reception.  If you have a question, by all means ask it, just try to provide concerns in a positive manner even if the concern is a negative one. You'll find those are better received and get more constructive responses.

When it comes to ticket support, I'm new at answering the tickets and so I'm still learning.  From my experience though, no matter the volume of tickets, they get answered a.s.a.p.  The weekends aren't guaranteed but some of the staff, myself included, check in to at least address issues that are urgent in nature.  These include an admin losing access to their account/ACP, board being completely inaccessible due to a software or data glitch, etc.  We understand that when someone has a board running, that if it stops functioning over the weekend, that having a response sooner than 'the next business day' can make a huge difference in how that weekend goes for both the board owner and their visitors.

Support via the forums isn't guaranteed, however for many generic questions, it's the best option.  "How do I take my board offline?" is a simple enough question that can be answered in a topic, either by staff or by another customer.  Some questions may require a closer look, so those are best done via a ticket while others may not fall in the scope of support and so go unanswered.  It's not that we don't care, it's that we have to prioritize.

If you want to test out the product, then open a demo and try it out.  If you want to see what others have done with their sites, then ask for that.  If you have other questions, by all means ask.  But please remember to keep the questions contained in as few topics as possible and try to remain positive.  It's better to ask, "What has support been like for you?" than to ask "Does support here suck?"  If someone has a concern with support, they'll answer either one.  But the first way is less likely to get you negative reactions.

[Jinkler]

Lindy, on 17 June 2011 - 09:10 AM, said:

Although our published ticket response times are 48 hours for non business licenses, I think you'll find most tickets are answered within a matter of a few hours, if not minutes in some cases.

I can vouch for that, I had a response yesterday within 10 minutes of submitting my ticket. And it also wasn't strictly 100% related to my forum, but the issue has been resolved quickly. Very pleased

[kenichi tanaka]

The Visitors, I think you're under a mis-conception. While I'll admit that the community, and even some IPS Staff can come off as hard headed and obnoxious (especially when you're just an IPS user), what you need to remember is that the majority of the community are developers. Have you ever tried talking to a software developer? It's like trying to read a technical manual when all you want to do is play with your new toy.

I mean this in the kindest way.

Sometimes, you just need to be specific and very detailed about what your concern is. Trust me, I have a lot of experience in trying to get my point across, since I know where you're coming from. Allowing your frustration to bubble to the surface won't get any kind of response and sometimes when someone posts a new topic and don't get a response, it's not that IPS is ignoring their inquiry, they simply haven't had a chance to get to their inquiry. Bfarber, Matt, Alex and their whole team are actually sympathetic and if you clearly state what you're asking, they'll do their best to answer your inquiry.

Personally, I've had nothing but positive support from IPS Support and they've always managed to handle whatever issue I've had where it concerns the IPB Software. Sometimes it gets repaired right away, other times it takes a few days to fix the issue. But, they do try their best at fixing any problem that comes up.

[Ben Stillman]

kenichi tanaka, on 17 June 2011 - 01:33 PM, said:

Have you ever tried talking to a software developer? It's like trying to read a technical manual when all you want to do is play with your new toy.

That made me chuckle.

[Jeuhen]

The Visitors,

I've tried vBulletin, I've tried XenForo, I've tried PHPbb, I've tried SMF, I've tried MyBB, but none of them gave me
as much satisfaction as IP.Board does. With IP.Board i can easily manage my community.

Never have i found an admin panel to be so clear about things, so easy to configure and understand. Take vBulletin
for example. Their Admin Panel interface is just a simple list on the left, and the content on the right.

IP.Board takes full advantage of the whole screen with a nice menu, simple HTML editor and simple everything.
In IPB's Admin panel everything seems to be packed up just right. Everything feels where it should be.



There are just hundreds of add-ons to make your community stand out, easy to manage and attractive to visitors.

I also use IP.SEO on my forum which allows me to view spider logs, keywords and visitors that came from a search engine.



I'd definitely recommend buying IP.Board (or the whole suite if that's what your community needs) if you want:

• An easy to manage forum board
  
• Tons of add-ons
  
• Great support
  
• User Friendly-ness
  
• Awesome Price/Quality ratio
  
• Lots, Lots, Lots of other great stuff.

But that's just the opinion of an IPS fan. Words cannot explain how much i love how IPB's system works.

At first i was just like you, to be honest. I was staring at it for months before finally making the decision to buy it.

I was 17 years old when i purchased Invision Power Board (which was a LOT of money for me) after seeing other
communities having good experiences with it. I was a little unsure if i'd purchase it or not, i'd miss $149 and only
get this piece of software in return.

But now, a year later, i'm a really satisfied customer and i can say that IP.Board was the right choice for me.

I also tested the demo of both IP.Board and vBulletin, and IP.Board was the big winner.

You also can sign up for a demo account at: http://www.invisionp.../suite/demo.php which i highly recommend.

Good luck with your purchase of Invision Power Board and i wish you and your community all the best.