Ads on MoveFlat need to be helpful for the people who are looking
This is a guide to getting an ad accepted on MoveFlat.
It is possible to have your advertisement declined by us if your ad isn't quite what we're looking for.
And that makes an important point.
We host you, not the reverse.
This means it's our site. It doesn't mean you are 'fortunate' or 'lucky' to get on MoveFlat, it just means that we have accepted your ad because we like it and think it will fit well on our site, and we are happy to run it.
Ads on MoveFlat need to be helpful for the people who are looking
It's a bad idea to completely ignore the guidance written in the form that you use to post your ad.
We mean what we say in it :-
Users of the site come here in quite large numbers now, because they are tired of the 'leg-work' they have to do in wading through ads that are posted elsewhere.
MoveFlat will not suit everybody: if your ad is aimed at a very transient audience such as people visiting the UK in order to travel for instance, then it is unlikely to be accepted.
Your ad needs to be a little bit chatty, and it needs to be accurate.
You should specify interests and occupations beyond 'socialising' and 'professional,' simply because the former conveys nothing to your reader, and the latter means you've got a job, which thankfully at the moment means nearly everyone.
That's it. That's all it requires
But we do reject ads, and the commonest reason that we do is that (as it seems to us) is that the person posting hasn't quite taken on board that we don't do the " It's a friendly flatshare in Church End, close to transport, give us a ring for more details !" kind of ad.
We take a lot of notice of 'Customer' feedback. Each flatshare ad contains a button 'is this ad OK' for people to feed back to us about ads. And they do, and we do act on it. These complaints are always about the same small minority of ads, and this is not something you should unduly worry about, unless of course you've fallen foul of the rules in a big way.
Ads on MoveFlat need to be helpful for the people who are looking
An ad is not helpful if omits information that could have easily been provided (for instance putting 'various' or 'professional' rather than stating the jobs of people in the flat or putting 'fun' under 'interests.'
The reason for this is that on average over one week, three hundred people on this site will click on and view your ad, and it's just not OK that three hundred people every week have to guess what you mean by 'various' or 'professional' or 'fun.'
An ad is not helpful if contains 'truth-warp;' N16 is not 'Islington' and a 'penthouse' is not the top floor of a local authority block, Lewisham isn't Docklands, Clapham Park isn't Clapham Common, Earls Court isn't Chelsea, West Hampstead isn't Hampstead and Streatham Hill isn't Brixton. A basement flat is unlikely to contain a 'bright and airy room.'
The large text box near the bottom needs some content. This is for additional information, so don't repeat things in it that you've already taken the time to provide. Use the 'Things you might want to write about' prompt list, and don't over-hype: if you describe everything as 'fantastic' well, we've seen lots of those ads
Lying is extremely unhelpful. So misquoting rents or saying you're not an owner-occupier when you are or lying about something else will very probably 'catch up' with you later. We advise you not to go down this route on this site because it offends us enormously and it can catch up with you just at a time when you didn't want it to.
Common pitfalls
The most common reason people don't get on the site is that thay have been posting on gumtree or loot, possibly for a year or more, and scan past the advice about posting at the start of the form on MoveFlat......and disregard it.
The site is different from these two: it doesn't regard everyone posting as a 'customer,' it is more concerned with what is displaying on the site rather than accepting any content.
This is a very important difference: we don't accept all content, and we won't be obliged to say why we aren't accepting it to the person posting the ad, in exactly the same way and reason that you keep a lock on your front door: not everyone can get into your home, and you don't have to say why.
Less common pitfalls
The other most common reason people don't get on the site is ..... nuisance.
If you've irritated us with repetitive postings, silly ads, using multiple e-mail addresses or names for the same room or property, then we aren't a computer, we're human and we are irritated and in a few cases very annoyed. In such a case you need to to do exactly the same you do with your friends when you've irritated them: back off and spend your attentions elsewhere for a while.
We're pretty forgiving. But if you keep and keep pushing it, we might not want to make your accquaintance anymore.
And lastly, we're sure this isn't you, if you you're really pushing it and try all sorts of things, then we may feel it is our responsibility to file a complaint with the police. We've done this twice now: PLEASE (please) Posting on websites using multiple aliases is not a good idea presently in the UK. This can get you into a circuit that you might not have thought possible, but these are strange times, and it is REALLY not a good idea on any UK web site.
Comments from people looking
People that have either phoned you or visited your property do contact us with comments.
We may require you to correct something in your ad.
It's very rare that it goes beyond this, but if it does, this is what happens.
If there are three confluent complaints from individuals about your conduct on the site, then we will contact them individually by e-mail or telephone and interview them.We will not contact you. By this process we have removed only four of over 200,000 advertisers on this site
Rights
You don't have a 'right' to post on MoveFlat.com
There are 35 London flatshare sites of which nearly all of them offer free adverts for flatshares offered.
Some of them are 'pile it high, sell it cheap, in the manner of a jumble sale.' Others employ rather cynical marketing tactics from a very large western nation, and others are home grown and have copied this. But the majority are smaller, well intentioned, are better presented than this site and could be just what you are looking for.
It's possible that you have been advertising on these free sites for some while, and they have been happy to accept your postings.
But that doesn't mean we have to because your ad isn't working on them..
We may be very happy to accept your ad ... but it doesn't mean that we have to, and sometimes we will decline.
Julian and MoveFlat.com
