Firearm Advertising on Reddit
Reddit is know as a community-driven and open-discussion platform. Like the saying “if it exists there’s a subreddit for it”, Reddit has established itself as “the front page of the internet”.
Advertising on Reddit gained huge popularity over the years because you could advertise to specific subreddits that fits your niche. It’s quite effective as the exposure guarantees that you’re advertising to the right audience. Not surprisingly, there’s a huge firearm community on Reddit which spans over a number of firearm-related subreddits. The popular firearm subreddits include guns, firearms, gun deals, guns for sale and many more. At first, Reddit may seem like the ideal place for firearm advertising, but upon closer inspection and personal experience, it may not be as easy as it seems.
One thing a new Reddit user might not realize at first is that although Reddit has minimal rules and restrictions, individual subreddits have its own rules that subscribers most follow. Breaking the rules will result in removing of posts or even banned from the said subreddits.
In most subreddits, self-promotion or the promotion of products as posts are strictly not allowed. This is the same with most firearm subreddits. Exceptions being subreddits such as gun deals or guns for sale. The name of those two subreddits are pretty self-explanatory. Gun deals post discounts on firearms and accessories from other firearm websites and guns for sale is, well, where you can buy, sell and trade guns.
When I first attempted do firearm advertising with Reddit, I wanted to advertise specifically in the gun deals and guns for sale subreddits. It made sense that a subreddit that allows the sale of firearms should also allow firearm advertising, right? False. My promotions were denied and the reason was “Reddit does not allow the promotion and sale of weapons”. Yes you read that right, that’s what the Reddit Advertising support had told me.
I immediately explained that I was trying to promote in sub reddits THAT ALLOWED THE BUYING AND SELLING OF FIREARMS. Are you telling me that Reddit allows sub reddits like “guns for sale” to exist yet you cannot do firearm advertising within that sub reddit? The answer is YES.
Don’t take my word for it, Take a look: Reddit Advertising Policy as of July 7, 2016
I tried a handful more times to try to get a firearm advertisement with no prevail. In the end I realized there’s no point. Just like Facebook, Reddit is inconsistent when it comes to firearms. While there’re subreddits where one can buy, sell and trade guns, to promote your store or products are still extremely difficult. If anyone out there had similar experiences advertising with Reddit, please share.
Auction Armory is still one of the only firearm social platforms that allows members to freely promote their shops and products with no restrictions. There’re many affordable and flexible advertise plans that can work for you. To learn more, about advertising with Auction Armory click here.
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Published in 2nd Amendment, Firearms
The work around is that you need to create a page similar to product page, but has to be an indepth page. Yes, a long content page like this https://www.evo.com/how-to-choose-a-snowboard-size-chart-and-buying-guide#abilitylevel , I realize this is not about guns, but you need to be creative and think of a page to develop before the commercial intent to the buy page (product page). Just my .02 cents worth!