How can we improve the bounty industry?

[DikkieD]

I've been participating in quite a few bounty campaigns over the past few months. I've had some good runs, and some bad ones. Overal, I can't complain on the bounties I've participated in. I however do start to get annoyed frequently by the way bounties are run, either through bounty managers or by projects themselves.

I feel that we are not taking advantage of the fact that we are with thousands on each campaign. We bring exposure, we help initial growth. We are the ones building the hype, attracting investors for presale (partly) and also the ones making/building the brand. We are however treated like peasants (of course, this is not always the case, but I don't feel the simple 'do better research' is a befitting solution here). Only a handful of bounty campaigns ended as smooth as they once started. Here things like clear tasks, clear communication and fast and proper finalization and payment all went great.

However, most are a mess.

I am now waiting for payment of 6 bounties that ended, some already over two months back. They all are trustworthly projects, no scams and (probably) no shitcoins. I did my research well and didn't chose bad apples. I also only participated in trustworthy bounty managers/bounty service agencies (not that this says much).

Issues I run into are (among others):

1) It takes months to finalize spreadsheets and therefore payment. You start to feel like they are doing this deliberately since they know a lot of volume (selling) will start after giving out the bounty %.

2) During the campaign there's hardly any communication. No timely status updates on reports and when you inquire about it, you risk getting the boot.

3) Changing the rules mid-bounty is an important one. Recently more and more campaign change the rules. Even worse is when they hardly disclose these new requirements. You work on a campaign for three weeks, then see zero stakes and you are told that you didn't post your report based on their meticulous requirements. In the end you find out that this wasn't 'set' yet when you started, but only weeks later.

4) Rules to try and keep you from getting stakes is another one. I suspect quite a few bounty managers doing this. Maybe you guys/gals can tell me why? Last month I joined a campaign that said I needed to report through their 'agenda'.....which is every 2 days and only on those days. Why you ask, maybe they want to do frequent updates? But no, did 7 reports in two weeks, but no stakes have been added yet. Silly rule, brings about much extra work and who benefits?

5) Unkind behavior of bounty managers is something that bugs me too. They provide a service to the project, they are not slave leaders. I almost get offended when rules have lines like 'if you don't follow our rules to the letter, you get no stakes'....why this approach? Don't we all work hard to build a brand in only a few months time?

6) Postponing bounty ending dates with no real communication towards bounty hunters. So you decided this bear market is crap for your ICO and you should wait a month for better momentum? Why not share this in time with your bounty hunters to get some acknoledgement? I now am participating in 3 bounty programs that were postponed last minute and two of them even did it twice now. You are in a head lock. You can't just quit. You need to continue as otherwise you risk not getting any more stakes...but the total bounty will stay the same for let's say over a month more work. I don't get why projects are so casual about this. They want us to work professionally, but they act like we are 2nd hand peasants. Of course I understand why a project perhaps must be postponed, we are also invested and often attracted to the project, especially if we are spending so much time promoting it. Wouldn't it be more obvious to involve us in this?

And there are probably a lot more examples.

Perhaps it's time for the next step in the bounty industry (I see it as an unregulated industry yes, since many millions are involved). Maybe we should work together to get some standards, to get some cooperation. Maybe bounty hunters should all join together to make this a more professional business. I mean, stop with the cowboy approach, there's no need. Regular (online/offline) businesses have been dealing with the same shit for decades, it's not bounty specific to promote start-ups in getting traction going on. We are providing an important service, but I get sick of being treated like I am just someone trying to earn a quick buck. Bounty programs I am involved in know my worth. Perhaps not all bounty hunters provide the same quality, but that too could be something worth exploring, let's say a 'bounty hunter review system' so hunters can start building their own brand.

What do you guys and gals think. Is the bounty industry ready for the next step of professionalism?

[DikkieD]

Just an example on how this bounty industry works. I joined a program 6 weeks ago. Nice project, thought it was a great fit so I started promoting it.

The rules were clear, I always copy/paste this into my own spreadsheet where I keep track of everything.

One of the rules said that reports done at the forums should not be edited afterwards. So I published the reports and didn't edit. However, weeks later I noticed a simple thing and decided to change this....the word 'twitter' became 'twitter' to stand out better since I later started with other bounty campaigns within the program.

5 weeks of reporting and only one week of stakes were accepted. When checking out why my other reports had no stakes I simply got the reply: 'Report was edited'. When I tried to find out more again: 'Report was edited'. After that a very unkind: 'those that not follow rules do not get stakes'.

I mean, this could all done in a much more professional way. I made a mistake, didn't know it literally meant to not edit the report...I thought they meant, do not edit the report by 'adding' work later on within the week.

Now 5 weeks of work, 1 week of stakes.....this is not the way....we are all part of a team promoting a project....I am sick of the way I (we) am treated.

Do you have any examples of bounties gone wrong?