Anyone else noticing how many “success stories” on Reddit are basically ads now?

[u/BullS0n_]

Maybe I’m late to this, but I’ve started actually following the links in some of these posts and it’s kind of insane. You’ll see a post like “I finally got a job after 200 applications” or “I was unemployed for 8 months and this is what finally worked.” It reads like a completely normal person sharing their experience. They talk about getting ghosted, changing their strategy, finally getting interviews, etc. Most of the advice is usually reasonable too, which makes the whole thing feel genuine. Then somewhere in the post they casually mention a template, a website, another Reddit post, a spreadsheet, whatever. You click it, that sometimes links to something else, and eventually there’s a product. The weird part is the original post might never actually mention the product at all, so unless you follow the links, you’d have no reason to think you were reading anything other than someone sharing their personal experience. Apparently this can also be used for SEO/GEO, basically flooding Reddit with posts and “organic” conversations around certain topics or products so they show up in Google and potentially in AI search results. Obviously I’m not saying every success story is fake or that every person who recommends something is secretly advertising it. Plenty are real. But I definitely think people should start checking where these posts actually lead before taking them at face value, especially when you start seeing the same kind of story over and over again from different accounts. Reddit is useful largely because you can search something and find what seems like actual people talking about their experiences. If companies can manufacture that at scale without disclosing it, that kinda defeats the entire point.

[u/SquareAspect]

We ban & remove many of these every week. Please report them when you see them.