Reputation from Mikenac - Page 2

Mikenac reacted to ChrisSilver in A look back at 2020 - and all of the positive achievements of TSF and members of TSF January 11, 2021

A look back at 2020

Important Stats

In 2020 TSF grew 62% faster than the growth in 2019
In 2020 there were 13,736 forum topics started on the forum vs 8430 new topics in 2019. This means that counting the new topics only, in 2020 there was over 62.94% increase in growth rate than in 2019. Similarly there were 118,321 posts on the forum in 2020 vs 73,024 new posts in 2019. This is over 62% increase in post volume growth when comparing the growth in 2020 and the growth in 2019.
This large increase in growth rate is in part due to the paid advertising promotions that we ran during 2020 as well as all of the TSF members who recommended TSF to other friends and like minded people and to those Premium Members who are helping to promote TSF with their eBay sales. Thank you to everyone who mentioned TSF to another person and helped to grow TSF. The more members that TSF has the more helpful knowledge is shared between helpful members. The more members the more deals that can be found in the forum’s trade section. Many members have benefited from selling large quantities of precious metals on the forum and in some cases thousands and thousands of ounces all with 0% commission. Thank you to all those who chose to buy and sell on the forum and to every member who decided to upgrade their membership to Premium Membership to help to support TSF to grow. The larger the forum grows the more deals that we can do with precious metals dealers in terms of offers and discounts for members who support the forum.

In 2020 we launched the Platinum Offers from selected dealers program, offering Platinum Premium Members discounts on purchases from selected dealers. This is a new benefit that did not exist before. We also added a Platinum PLUS Premium Membership offer as several members had contacted the forum to ask if they could support TSF further, Platinum PLUS builds on the offers in the Platinum Offers, with increased value of the offers. An extra special thank you to Platinum PLUS and Platinum Premium Members. We hope to increase the dealers in this program as the forum grows, adding more offers. All offers or discount codes that TSF secure, are passed on in full to members as TSF supports itself from Premium Membership purchases. We can proudly say that we do not take any commissions from dealers or auction houses on the forum and can therefore provide members with a fair and unbiased platform for members to discuss different dealers and offers they find in the precious metals industry. If TSF decide to do any affiliate offers in the future to help to support the forum, we will clearly state this at the time so it is transparent for members and they are aware that TSF receive a commission from such links. This is why Premium Membership is important to the long term survival and growth of the forum, as we currently make no commission from any dealers that members choose to purchase from.

In 2020 there were 6575 new member registrations, vs 2364 in 2019. This means that our growth rate of new members increased by 178% in 2020 vs the growth in 2019.

Based on the above statistics we therefore believe that TSF is likely the fastest growing precious metals community on the internet, as well as one of the longest well established precious metals forums that exist. TSF started in 2014.

Sales section stats & Arshimo's stats

Due to the popular rise of graded coins in the UK, TSF introduced a specific separated graded coin section on the forum.
In 2020 there were 7969 trade listings, including all graded and ungraded listings (excluding non PM items) note that this figure also includes wanted adds, but also to note that the vast majority of ‘for sales’ listings include multiple items for sale from the seller in a single listing.

In 2019 the trade section figure for the above was 3770. You can therefore see the large increase in trade on the forum in only a one year period.

Arshimo, listed 171 listings in his Official Sponsorship section in 2020 where many Premium Members managed to secure deals from him. Arshimo is also in the Platinum Offers from selected Dealers programme, thank you for offering the top tier members who decide to support TSF the most with additional discounts on your deals.

Members choosing to buy and sell on the forum is one of the reasons why some members choose to optionally upgrade to Premium Membership. Premium Members can see trade listings, as well as Arshimo’s deals 3 days earlier, so all of the good deals are likely to go in this period to Premium Members. Members who support TSF therefore have a better chance at getting the deals. We have however maintained a free option and even FREE standard members are able to buy items as well as list 1 trade listing per 30days (with no limit on the amount of items listed for sale per listing) We thank those who choose to buy and sell on TSF as well as a special thank you to those who decide to upgrade to Premium Membership.

New Official Sponsors & Dealers who joined in 2020

@BackyardBullion who TSF have sponsored for many years became an Official Sponsor sponsor of TSF in 2020. You can see his section here.

@ilovesilverireallydo trading as Bargain Numismatics also became an Official Sponsor, and we also invite you to check his items for sale in his Official Sponsor section here.

@artincoins in Canada, who specialises in Luxury Numismatics and art piece also started their dealer sub section and joined the Platinum Offers programme.

Along with @SVcollector in Greece, who became an Official Sponsor and also who joined the Platinum Offers program, please see his forum section here.

@PowerCoin in Italy, also joined the forum, from a recommendation from a helpful member and customer of theirs, they then became an Official Sponsor, and their section is here.

Chards also started offering offers for Platinum members and are also an Official Sponsor, thank you to @ChardsCoinandBullionDealer and also to @LawrenceChard for your helpful contributions on the forum.

@TheCoinCabinet became an Official Sponsor of the forum, their section can be found here.

@CoinsOfTheRealmAuctions joined TSF as an Official Sponsor and we started a partnership to offer members an NGC grading service, with an optional TSF branded label, they are also offering some fantastic discounts for Premium Members on selling at their auctions, as well as discount vouchers for auction purchases.

There were also many other new Dealers on the forum in 2020 including @InvestInCoins888, @Coincollectingenterprises, @BullionExchanges (please see their forum sub sections here)

For a full list of all Official Sponsors and Dealer sub sections please see here.

Continued partnership with BackyardBullion

Many thanks to @BackyardBullion who produces the TSF branded hand poured items. Despite a world-wide pandemic that halted the network of many if not all industries, with all precious metals mints stopping production for some time and large backlogs. BYB still managed to produce all of the planned 2020 TSF items and get them out to members. These hand poured items are produced with such a high level of quality and thought and we could not have asked for a better hand poured artist to have partnered with.

The final statistics for the 2020 TSF branded and poured items were:

200x 1 oz TSF rounds
150x 100g TSF bars
60x 3oz TSF rounds
25x 5oz hammered rounds

TSF also commissioned a special 10oz silver bar from BYB to celebrate when we hit 10,000 forum members. This was given away in a prize draw for Premium Members and @adamthetaller was the luckily winner. We also had a special 1oz 10,000 round commissioned by BYB which was given away in a prize draw open to all members including free standard members, and won by @UnoWho.

Prize Draws & Competitions

In 2020 there were 42 Prize Draws listed on our Prize Draw section of the forum, some draws containing multiple 1oz coins, and some of the listings were for larger silver prizes including some silver 5oz bars. These Prize Draws were in addition to all of the competitions and trade incentives that we organised, some of the competitions even included proof coins as well as some TSF merchandise and even a ½ sovereign PF70 graded coin. @RoslandGold joined as an Official Sponsor and has sponsored a lot of Prize Draws in 2020 and we have some more prizes and competitions planned for 2021.

There were several fun @5huggy DAFT competitions ran to help promote fun and positivity on TSF and we would be delighted to sponsor some more prizes for some 2021 @5huggy DAFT competitions if he is willing to run some

With all of the Prize Draws and Competitions above that TSF ran, they equate to more than 1 new Prize Draw / Competition per week!

TSF also ran a 2020 Christmas Prize Draw for members, with everyone who donated a prize being giving a prize from another member. In previous years this was ran by @Bullionbilly, but as he was unable to organise this year, TSF and @trp helped out with the smooth running of the Christmas Prize Draws. TSF provided prizes to cover a member who had to drop out of the Prize Draw, as well as for a duplicate entry and dispatched these prizes to the winners, meaning everyone who entered received a prize.

Some other 2020 achievements

The Spot Price bar was introduced.

Many new USA members joined the forum, as well as members from different countries worldwide. We have members from over 100 countries.

We moved the forum to very high end servers with a good global routing network to help better serve the forum’s website across the USA as well as other parts of the world where members are located.

We launched a Compare Gold prices page for Premium Members, with extensive help from @Darr3nG, and our developers. Thank you to @Darr3nG for helping out on this.

Multiple topics, also including some charity auctions were created in relation to helping to donate for charities. And many members decided to help good causes, including auctions that were ran by @Roy for the NHS with many members also helping out.

Two fantastic new Moderators joined the Moderation team, @trp and @Lr103. They have both been a tremendous help to the forum and we thank you for your time that you have put into the forum to keep it running smoothly. Thank you also to all of the existing Moderators, @morezone, @HelpingHands, @HyHy and @barney.

There are lots of other things that happened in 2020, and this topic may not include everything, but a thank you goes out to all of the members.

There are many members who are extremely polite and respectful to other members, and who have added a lot of positivity. Thank you to all of those members

2021 and the years ahead

TSF are committed to the continual growth and development of The Silver Forum to build and maintain the world’s largest and greatest precious metals forum with the greatest members.

We are planning for 2021 to be even bigger, but we need your help. If you would like to support TSF to grow please consider purchasing Premium Membership. A large portion of the Premium Membership fee goes directly back into paid advertising to help to grow the forum.

An extra special thank you to all of the Premium Members who help to support TSF, without you we would not have been able to achieve all of the things above.
If you would like to help TSF to grow further in 2021 and if you feel that the existence of TSF has been useful for you please consider upgrading your membership today.