Oct
Prosper Referral Program Closes
Prosper Marketplace has just announced that their affiliate program has shut down and has requested that sites “take down any reference to Prosper immediately.” It seems ridiculous to remove all references to Prosper especially since this would take a long time to remove all mentions of Prosper in a P2P lending blog. However, I will remove the advertisements that are currently being displayed here offering the Prosper account sign up bonus.
It does not surprise me that the closure of the Prosper referral program follows the announcement of the Prosper quiet period. This is the same pattern that Lending Club followed — except Lending Club announced the quiet period at the exact same time they closed the referral program. I hope that Lending Club’s referral program returns soon now that they have exited their quiet period and returned to P2P lending.
Here is the note from Prosper announcing the end of the referral program that I received tonight:
Dear XXXX,
We are writing to inform you that the Prosper Referral Program has been shut down and is no longer in effect. Our lender activity is limited. Click here to learn more.
As a result we request you take down any reference to Prosper immediately.
Thank you for your immediate attention in this matter.
Sincerely,
Prosper
Update: I had forgotten that Prosper had announced the referral program was over in July. I had forgotten because they still recently paid out a referral bonus to me, so I am not certain if the July announcement had ever been enforced. I am wondering if they had wanted to end the referral program due to the numerous P2P lending websites like mine that started out blogging about Prosper to earn a few referral bonuses only to later post negative information about Prosper.
Brett,
I’m not really sure what “any reference to Prosper” means. I suspect they mean advertisements. Just because Prosper is in a quiet period doesn’t mean the rest of us are also in a quiet period and can’t talk about Prosper.
Prosper did announce they closed the referral program in July and then didn’t actually close it – they modified it.
As for the timing of the announcement, I think you are right. Many of the events of the past few days point to a quiet period that surprised Prosper. It seems like they didn’t see it coming and were not prepared.
As for some good news – you would be happy to know LC did open up a referral program on Commission Junction a couple of days ago. You should check it out.
After reading your post I realized others probably do not know about LC’s new referral program so I did up a quick post –
Lending Club announces new referral program
The request to remove “any references to prosper†was certainly strange. I agree with you that they likely intended for it to mean the advertisements or mentions of sign up bonuses. This poorly written notice following two days after the quiet period announcement lends evidence to the theory that Prosper was rushed into a quiet period.
I was not aware of the Lending Club referral program, so thanks for letting me know about it.
Is the referral program still over? I looked at Prospects site and haven’t seen a thing. Nothing from Lending Club either…
Lending Club has a referral program through Commission Junction now.