BPN is a nonprofit founded to support and inform parents. While we do think it is useful for parents to be able to learn about local services, schools, and businesses on BPN, it is not the primary mission of BPN. Therefore we intentionally restrict promotional posts. We do not publish "ads" like local newspapers and other sites do, and parents may not use their free subscriptions to promote their own business, or their friends' or relatives'. We offer paid community subscriptions to local schools and businesses so they can let parents know about their offerings, while also providing the funds for BPN to operate and continue to offer free subscriptions to parents.
Promotional postings that BPN accepts
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Parent Subscribers can post advice, reviews, and recommendations on BPN. All reviews and recommendations must describe the parent's first-hand experience, and they may not promote their own business or that of a friend, relative, or colleague. (See FAQ for Parent Q&A for more info.)
- Community Subscribers can post announcements as often as every 30 days to let parents know about their kid-friendly or family-friendly services and programs:
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The Events and Announcements listings accept posts from community subscribers who are announcing openings in their programs, tours and open houses, and family-friendly events.
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The Childcare listing accepts posts from community subscribers who are babysitters and nannies who are available to provide childcare to local families.
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The Tutor & Teacher listing accepts posts from private individuals who have purchased a community subscription and who have availability as a tutor or teacher.
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Parents' posts that are PROHIBITED on BPN
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Reviews that benefit you or your friends or family members. BPN does not accept reviews of a business posted by the owner, or the owner's friends, family or colleagues. We also do not accept reviews posted in exchange for a favor, discount, or any type of compensation, including posting reviews of a school to fulfill a school requirement. If your review deliberately conceals your relationship to the business, your subscription can be revoked. In some cases all reviews of the school or business will be removed from the BPN website. See Compensated and Reciprocal Reviews and Deceptive Reviews.
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Reviewing the same school or business more than once. Since reviews can be submitted anonymously on BPN, multiple reviews of a business by the same person are difficult for readers to spot, and can give the false appearance that a business is more popular than it really is. Subscribers that persist in recommending the same business repeatedly, after a warning from the moderator, may be unsubscribed.
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Sending a private message to a BPN subscriber offering paid services. It is a violation of BPN's Privacy Policy to use BPN's messaging system to an send unwanted message to another subscriber. Unwanted messages include recommending or offering any type of paid service that you provide, or that is provided by a friend or family member. Community subscribers may send messages about their business as long as they are offering a service that was specifically requested by the original poster. Your subscription can be revoked for violating this policy.
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Posting a question asking how to market your business. BPN doesn't accept questions asking whether there is interest in your product or service, or seeking advice about how to market your product or service. These posts conflict with BPN's policy about advertising and promotion. (Note: BPN does accept paid subscriptions from child-related business that are seeking parents for marketing research. See Research Queries on BPN for more information. )
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Posting about multi-level marketing. BPN does not accept reviews or announcements about goods and services that are sold using multi-level marketing. Per Wikipedia: "Multi-level marketing (MLM) is a marketing strategy in which the sales force is compensated not only for sales they personally generate, but also for the sales of the other salespeople that they recruit." (see Multi-level marketing and Wikipedia's list of multi-level marketing companies.)
Community subscribers' posts that are PROHIBITED on BPN
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Posting an announcement more than once in 30 days. The weekly newsletter contains only "new" posts from the past 7 days, but announcements are published for 30 days on the website. Community subscribers may not "game the system" by unpublishing their announcement before the 30 days is up, and then posting again in order to appear in more than once newsletter in a 30-day period.
- Posting to Parent Q&A or Parent Connections. Business owners who are also parents may not use their parent account to promote their business or give professional advice or recommend colleagues.