How do I use Email Alerts on the Profile page?

You can access this feature by clicking on the “Edit” link next to your username on the upper left of all the pages on the site and then selecting the “Email Alerts” link. The Email Alerts feature will allow members to stay in touch with activity on CrowdPicks using both email and private message (PM) alerts. When you register, only a limited number of alerts will be enabled so be sure to review and edit your alerts settings.

The alerts available include:

·         New Trophy Received – Receive an email and/or PM any time a new trophy is earned and awarded to you

·         Trophy Updated - Receive an email and/or PM any time you receive an additional existing trophy

·         Comments to News – Receive an email and/or PM any time a new comment is made to your news or blog

·         Friend Accepted – Receive an email and/or PM any time a friend you invited to join My Crowd accepts the invite

·         Friend Invites – Receive an email and/or PM any time a member invites you to join their My Crowd

·         Favorite Team Game Available for Pick- Receive an email and/or PM any time a game with your favorite team in that sport becomes available with a new pick. To update your favorite teams simply click the Update Profile link in your profile module.

·         New Crowd Note - Receive an email and/or PM any time a new Crowd Note is posted to your Trophy Room

·         Bench Warning – If you are within one day of getting “Benched” in a sport for not making a pick in 14 days, an alert will be sent

·         Bench Notification – This will alert you that you have now been benched in the sport with no possibility to compete on leaderboards. To get off the bench simply make one pick in the sport.

·         Revenue Deposit - Receive an email and/or PM any time a deposit is made to your account from the Revenue Share Program

 How do I use Private Messages in the Inbox?

The Private Messages can be accessed by selecting the “Inbox” button on the left side of the lower navigation bar. Once on the Private Messages page you can review existing messages in your Inbox, compose new messages, and access Preferences to customize the experience. You can set up notifications and read receipts for when a private message is sent to you. You can also set up signatures, including adding your CrowdPicks Badge to your private message signature. To add the Badge to your Private Message signature simply copy the Image Code into your signature field, name the signature, and update to save it. When you send a private message, select the signature checkbox you want to use at the bottom of the page and you’re set! 

How do I use the Picks Summary in the Trophy Room?

This module provides you with a summary of how many picked and unpicked games you have across each sport. At a quick glance you can find out which sports have new games available to pick and quickly link to their picks page. A similar version of this module is also available on the top of the Picks page.

What is CrowdPicks^®?

CrowdPicks^® is a sports picking community where members make predictions on pro and college sports games and establish credibility, or “sports cred”, through their “CrowdScore”.  This score is our proprietary score that incorporates several different picking criteria into one score based on a 100 point scale, and it is designed to show who knows sports and who doesn’t.  CrowdPicks also uses a unique avatar system that is tied to every member’s CrowdScore. The purpose of the avatar system is to give a simple visual display of who knows sports and who doesn’t.  The CrowdScore and associated sports avatars, represents the fan throughout the site allowing them to show off their knowledge and sports cred.  We also produce aggregate community predictions that we share with you in the Community Picks modules and in the CrowdFilter results; thus the name “CrowdPicks”.  For more about who we are, see the “About Us” section.

How do I get started?

Start by signing up, it’s free to join and all we need is your e-mail address.  Since this is a social site however, the experience will be enhanced if you provide a little more information about yourself, including your favorite teams in each sport, and even post a picture.  Next, start making picks on games to build your CrowdScore and start earning trophies for your trophy case.  Participate in the community by writing blogs, voting on polls, posting comments, or chat. Finally, earn rewards for your participation on the site.

What sports can I make picks on?

We cover a variety of sports for picking including:

·          Football – NFL and NCAA Division 1 (some Division 1 games may not be available if a   Division 2 school plays)

·          Basketball – NBA and NCAA

·          Baseball – MLB

·          Hockey – NHL

·          Auto Racing – NASCAR Sprint Cup Series

·          Golf – PGA Tournaments

·           Soccer – We will cover multiple leagues including

o        English Premier League

o        USA Soccer (MLS)

o        Spain La Liga

o        Italy Serie A

o        Germany Bundesliga

o        National Teams

Additional sports may be added in the future.

CrowdPicks uses Vegas point spreads - is this a gambling site?

No it isn’t, and you cannot gamble here.  We use Vegas lines because it provides another level of information for making predictions on games and for determining a CrowdScore bonus in some sports.  We also think that the data we collect may be of more value to some if it included the Vegas lines and used them to help measure member picks performance.

What browser should I use to get the best out of CrowdPicks?

We have built and optimized the CrowdPicks experience to take advantage of IE7.0. Although most any browser will work including Firefox, Safari, Opera, and older versions of IE, to get the most from us we recommend IE7.0.

Nothing, it’s totally free to join CrowdPicks and use almost the entire site but we do charge a subscription for access to the CrowdFilter and the IntelliPicks reports. You can also purchase the IntelliPicks reports individually without a subscription.

How do I gain “Sports Cred”?

At CrowdPicks^® credibility is the cornerstone of our community.  Without individual sports cred you can’t tell if a community member is full of it or someone who really knows sports, so we needed a way for our community members to earn credibility.  The way we chose to add this component is to have everyone predict scores from the weekly sports schedule, and we keep track of who does the best throughout the season for each sport and each team. To gain sports cred you must make picks though! We represent your sports cred using various forms of “social currency” including the CrowdScore, the avatars, and the trophy case. 

How do I unregister?

If you decide to no longer use CrowdPicks and you prefer to disable your account, please send an email to info@crowdpicks.com. Once we receive your request we will disable the account so no one can login and we’ll also remove the email address from our records. By making this request you will forfeit any Revenue Share balance you have. In the future, if you decide to return to CrowdPicks, we will need a request in writing from the original email address of record, in order to reactivate the account.

How does Community Picks work?

On the homepages you will see a list of a few games with the most picks along with a bar graph.  The bar graph displays what percentage of the community has picked a certain team to win.  For NASCAR and PGA, the percent of picks for that driver or golfer for the top three places is represented by the bar graph. We include links to the Team, Driver, or Golfer pages to take you directly to the My Picks page to make picks. You can use the “More” button at the bottom of the module to access the CrowdFilter (a subscription will be required for all the features) and dig into the aggregate picks data some more.  

How does the Blogs feature work?

On the left side of the navigation menu you’ll see a set of buttons including “Blogs” which take you to a page full of content such as blogs, news, and videos. By default, we’ll display “Featured Content” which contains the best content as scored by the CrowdPicks system. You can change the order of the content to display based on the “# of Comments” or the “# of Views”. You can also filter content by sport or teams.

Members can post content on this page including blogs, news links, and videos using the “Add Content” button. Adding content is really important because it increases your page views therefore boosting your Revenue Share payout. When you submit content we require you to select a headline to display. We also recommend a primary and secondary tag be used so the sport and team related to the story are known – this allows us to tag all content (news, blogs, videos) and also place the story on the team’s page. These tags are important so people following certain teams can easily identify content related to them. When users write a blog we allow them to upload an image to add more color and give your story more character. You want your content to stand out because attracting more eyeballs means more share of revenue! When you upload a video simply provide the URL of the video and we’ll embed it into the content page. You can also provide a description for the content when you submit it. We encourage our users to post blogs but make sure you take the time to write a quality piece and not just a one-liner. If you post blogs that don’t have much in the body or you post too many of them daily then you will find it more difficult to get into the Featured Content section of each sport page where you will have the best chance to get your blog read.

What is Featured Content and how does it work?

What is the CrowdFilter?

The CrowdFilter is a tool that allows you to get “smarter” predictions on future games.  By smarter we mean that you can filter out members that may not be very good at picking scores.  The CrowdFilter aggregates the predictions (picks) from all our members and allows the user to filter information based on several criteria so you can narrow down the data to just what you want. Since we track all sorts of criteria like win/loss percentage, against the point spread percentage and over/under accuracy, you can filter by several different criteria to find those members that you feel will be the most accurate. You can access basic features in the CrowdFilter for free but other advanced tools like the filter options requires a CrowdPicks subscription. When you select the “More” button on the bottom of the Community Picks module, you will be taken to the CrowdFilter with the sport pre-selected but not other filters set. 

How do I use the CrowdFilter?

First, select the sport which you would like to get a prediction on.  Now you can determine which additional filters you want to use including the “Advanced” tab options but you will only have access to the filters if you purchase a CrowdPicks subscription. Next, start filtering out members by raising the “Member Accuracy” amount from zero so only members that have scores above that number will be included in your filter search results.  There are also a few different member accuracy settings to use such as Win/Loss accuracy, Against the Spread accuracy (ATS), Over/Under accuracy (O/U) and of course our favorite, the CrowdScore.  Finish your core filter requirements by selecting a timeframe for your search.  Are you interested in members that have been consistent all season long or just those that have been hot the last week?  The time setting allows you to choose. The filter results will be displayed on the lower part of the page and will display in two different modules – one with the “CrowdPicks Odds” on the left and the “Aggregate Results” on the right. The odds section will display a summary of odds for the games that came back in the results. We’ll show you the Vegas odds, the CrowdPicks odds, and the difference between the two so you can quickly spot outliers that might indicate a weakness in the Vegas odds. On the right we’ll show you a graphical representation of W/L, ATS, and O/U for each game that’s displayed in the results. We’ll also show you the aggregate predicted score of the game based on the filters you set.

What are CrowdPolls and how do they work?

The CrowdPicks team will create polls for our members to vote on periodically. These polls will be specific to a sport and will allow members, and usually non-members (if we make it public), to vote on them. We will only allow both members and non-members to vote once and we’ll track how many times you vote in order to manage this. Polls will appear on the “Polls” page which you can access through the secondary navigation bar. If the sport season is over, a poll will appear on the sport homepage otherwise if the season is active you’ll see the Community Picks module. On the left side of the CrowdPolls page you will see a list of all active polls for each sport. Click on any of these links to vote and view the poll results.

We will provide two types of polls – ranked and non-ranked polls. Ranked polls offers you a list of multiple team selections to choose from and we score your selections by assigning points to each one. Your top pick will get the most points while the lowest one gets the least. So for example, if we asked you to pick the top 3 NFL teams, your top pick will get a score of 3, the second one 2, and the last one 1 point. The most unique aspect of our ranked polls is that they are heavily weighted with your CrowdScore. If you have a CrowdScore below 40, then no weight is applied. For scores above this value, we weight your entry by 1/10^th of your CrowdScore. So if you have an 80 CrowdScore, your weighted responses before ranking are worth 8 points each while another member with a 50 CrowdScore will only get 5 points, and someone below a 40 CrowdScore, or a non-member, will only get 1 point. So the combination of weights based on CrowdScore and ranked selections, makes for a unique and “smart” set of results. If a CrowdScore restriction exists on a poll, you’ll see a message below the poll question with the minimum CrowdScore required to participate. We also allow poll participants to change their vote by using the “Edit Vote” button. We also want to encourage an exchange of ideas with our polls so make sure to utilize the Comments section to expand on or explain your votes.

How do I make a pick?

After you log in to your account, the "My Picks" button in the left navigation bar will take you to your game picks page.  Once there, you’ll find various games available to make a pick on for each sport (when scheduled and during the season). You will see a “My Picks Summary” module on the upper left of the page to quickly identify which sports you have made game picks on and which are still open. CrowdPicks requires that you predict the score of each game, not just the winner like most other Pick’em sites. When you predict the score, we’ll automatically calculate the spread and over-under for you. In the case of NASCAR and PGA, you’ll simply pick the top finishers and have an option to pick two more finishers in any slot you like (i.e. 10^th, or 40^th). If you want to filter out picks for just one league, something that’s helpful for NCAA sports or soccer where many teams are available, simply select the appropriate “Filter Teams By” option. Keep in mind that you can click on the “Save” link to remember your selection for future sessions.

In some cases like football, you can choose to pick either the points scored by each team (the predicted team scores under the “My Score” column) OR the spread & total points (the predicted Spread and Over-Under in the “My Spread” column). Before making your pick, decide which method you prefer and select the appropriate Default Entry Method radio button on the top of the page. NASCAR and PGA will require you to select who will place 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd for the race but you also have the option of predicting who will finish in any two other places. Keep in mind that NASCAR and PGA use “odds” instead of a “spread” for picks predictions.

Once you “Submit” your pick, the game pick module will change colors – from orange to dark blue. It will also display your predicted winner, ATS (spread) if applicable, and which side of the Over-Under your prediction falls. Regardless of sport, we have made the process of making picks quick, easy, and fun, so pick away!  If you change your mind later you can “Edit” your pick by selecting the button, however, keep in mind that the point spread can change throughout the week and if you choose to edit your score you may have different odds applied to your picks. Once you make a pick in any sport, we will not allow you to cancel your pick – hell, you can’t ask for your money back after a bet right? The Vegas Odds you see in your game picks details box at the time you submit or edit your pick, will be the odds that your pick will be evaluated on. If the odds happen to change after submitting your pick, the new odds will appear in a small red font below the original odds.

Note that for Soccer picks we’ll allow you pick a draw (a tie) as a prediction (including a 0-0 score) and we’ll give you the credit for a “Win” if the outcome is a tie. However if the outcome is not a draw, you’ll lose CrowdScore points. Keep in mind that about 25% of all soccer games do end in a draw so picking them that way all the time will not help you in the long run. Try to use draw picks only when you think the teams playing are evenly matched.

When can I make my picks?

Throughout the week games are added to the My Picks page and are then available for everyone to make predictions on.  You can make your picks any time from the minute a game becomes available on the picks page until kickoff (tip-off, face-off, etc.), but the earlier you make your picks, the better for you for several reasons.  First, you get the benefit of locking in the current odds and having the choice later to take more updated odds.  Second, we will start paying members for their picks that we use in our “IntelliPicks” reports that we sell and if your picks are in early, the better chance you will have to get your picks selected by our computer as a “IntelliPicks” candidate. To ensure you are notified right away when picks for a sport come in, make sure to have email alerts set (My Alerts in the Trophy Room) for your favorite team’s games being available. The availability of games for picking is provided as early as we can get good odds but generally we make them available as follows:

Do I need to make a prediction on every game?

No, in fact it’s better to not make a pick on a game you are unsure of.  Even though you are rewarded a little for the more games you pick, a wrong prediction will hurt your CrowdScore more than an unpicked game.  The best rule of thumb is to pick what you know and what you are confident in.  The top pickers on the leader board won’t pick every game, so pace yourself.  We’ll try to provide you with some information you can use to help determine which picks may give you the best chance of increasing your sports cred. We include info like the Vegas odds, records, and tools like the CrowdFilter.

How do I use the Picks Summary?

This module provides you with a summary of how many picked and unpicked games you have across each sport. At a quick glance you can find out which sports have new games available to pick and with one click go to the desired Picks page for that sport. A similar version of this module is also available on the top of the Picks page.

How do I get on the Top 10 Season Leaderboard?

There are two top 10 lists that we track, “Season” and “Last 7 Days” which appear on the homepage for each sport. In order to appear on the season top 10 you must have a top 10 CrowdScore rank in that sport and have met the minimum picks requirements for the season at that time (it goes up each season trimester – see the Leaderboard and My Picks pages for messages on the minimums). The same goes for the last 7 days except that the pick minimums for the week are lower. By doing well with your picks and reaching these lists, which are on homepages where we see the most traffic, you will increase your own Trophy Room views and thus boost your Revenue Sharing earnings.

How do I earn the "MVP" award & appear on the Season Top 10 list?

During the off-season the top 10 season leaderboard on the homeage will have trophies next to the names of the members; this indicates that those members finished in the top 10 for the season.  The top member gets a unique MVP trophy. In order to appear on the season MVP and Top 10 list you must have one of the top 10 highest CrowdScores at the end of the season and have met the minimum picks requirements for the end of the season. Those fortunate enough to have earned this status are rewarded with a special trophy. The “MVP” for the member with the top season CrowdScore will get prominent placement on the top of the Leaderboard with the remaining top 9 slots appearing below. They also earn a rare Unique trophy called the “MVP” while the other top 9 earn a Season Top 10 trophy – these trophies are displayed in the Leaderboard and each member’s  trophy case. This exposure is sure to help get you page views and boost your views for Revenue Share. In general, at least 10% of the picks for the season must be met but the individual limits are set for each sport and available for you to review on the top of the "Leaderboard" page and in the “What is the CrowdScore?” section of the FAQ and Help.

What is the Revenue Share Leaderboard?

How do I use the Leaderboard page?

This page can be accessed through the lower navigation bar “Leaderboard” link and will display a Season Leaderboard with all the members and their rank, that have made picks in each sport that have met the minimum picks requirements. The primary sport menu will control which sport you view. If you wanted to see who has the highest CrowdScore in MLB then go to Leaderboard in the lower navigation menu and then select MLB. You can view the top ranked members along with key stats on their picks. You can also sort the data in each column from highest to lowest to help you identify the best performers in each scoring category. The default view will display the CrowdScore from highest to lowest. A message at the top of the page will tell you what the minimum number of picks required are for each sport in order to appear on the Leaderboard. Each page will display 50 members so use the paging links on the bottom to look beyond the first page. If you run a search with the name field blank you will be able to view all members including those that haven’t met the minimums.

How do I use the Members page Season Leaderboard?

The Members page will display a Season Leaderboard with all the members that have made picks in each sport that have met the minimum picks requirements along with their rank for that sport. The primary sport menu will control which sport you view. If you wanted to see who has the highest CrowdScore in MLB then go to Members in the secondary navigation menu and then select MLB. You can view the top ranked members along with key stats on their picks. You can also sort the data in each column from highest to lowest to help you identify the best performers in each scoring category. The default view will display the CrowdScore from highest to lowest. A message at the top of the page will tell you what the minimum number of picks required are for each sport in order to appear on the Season Leaderboard. Each page will display 50 members so use the paging links on the bottom to look beyond the first page.

Will CrowdPicks^® share my personal information with anyone?

Never!  Please refer to our Privacy Statement.

What time standards do you follow?

The time standards we follow are based on Eastern Time. All the time stamps you see in the News & Blogs, Crowd Notes, Game/Race Time, and the race and game start times are in ET.

Can I change my login name?

You can’t.  We are dependent on our member’s credibility and if we allowed login name changes we would lose that element.

Can I have more than one account?

Obviously we can’t completely control this, but we highly discourage it and we reserve the right to remove any members who try and maintain multiple accounts.  In the future, if we feel that the integrity of our site is at risk from too many multiple accounts, we may take steps beyond simply tracking IPs.

How long will Beta last?

When we are confident that all of the defects have been worked out and we have added all of the new features and content that we, as well as you, want on the site, we will move out of Beta. Hopefully in 2008 we’ll be ready. As a result of this being a Beta period, some things may change (like adding new features :), but we will try to keep the disruptions to a minimum and we welcome any and all feedback.

How does the New Members module work?

When a member joins the community they will appear on the New Members list. You can use this module to locate new members that you may want to invite to join you’re my Crowd.

Did you read The Wisdom of Crowds?

Yes, and we’re big fans of James Surowiecki’s book.  We were excited to see someone put a name to something that we have believed for a long time.  This book also influenced our method for gathering data on our “Picks Page” independently as possible instead of sharing results with you prior to your prediction.  The biggest difference in opinion that we have with Mr. Surowiecki is that we believe we can get even better results with a smarter crowd, which is why we created our “CrowdFilter,” so our members can screen their data to their liking.  We truly believe that “experts” are no match for a large group of informed “amateurs,” and we plan to launch a few other websites in the future to test this belief.  Regardless of what you believe, we highly recommend that you buy and read The Wisdom of Crowds.

Is CrowdPicks.com owned by or related to any team or league?

What is CrowdPicks Mobile and how does it work?

How do I read the Picks & Stats module in the Trophy Room?

Every member that makes picks will have their results appear in this module. At the top of the module we display your “Last 7 Days” and “This Season” scores including the CrowdScore and your performance in score categories (W, ATS, and O/U) and we summarize the results of each picked game. Each section is separated by dates with all the games you picked on that day. Once a game starts your picks will disappear from the My Picks page and will appear in the Picks & Stats module which will update once the game ends. You can switch sports by using the sports menu (links) on the top of the module or use the primary sports menu on the top of the page. Each checkmark indicates a correct pick for that category. Clearly, you want to see a lot of checkmarks in your module. Several sports have three categories including Win/Loss (W) prediction, Spread (ATS) prediction, and Over/Under (O/U). You will also note that links for paging will appear at the bottom of the page once a certain number of picks have been made and scored. We also capture and display the Line (Vegas Spread) AT THE TIME YOUR PICK WAS MADE – the closing Line may be different than yours. We also display the final score of the game so you can have a reference for comparing your predictions. If a “P” appears in the ATS or O/U column it means that you “Pushed” and we give you credit for that category result, just like a win.

How do I select my favorite sport and favorite teams in my Profile?

In the Trophy Room, you’ll see the profile module on the top right of the page. In the “Favorites” section of that module on the right of the header you’ll see a “Edit” link - simply click the link, select the “Favorite Teams & Profile” link edit the favorites. Use the radio buttons to select your favorite sport and the drop down menus to select your favorite teams. Don’t forget to click the “Update” button on the bottom of the page to save your changes. By making these selections we will be able to provide you with alerts on when those games are available for picks and allow you to quickly jump to those team pages for the latest news and scores. This also allows members to find others with the same favorite teams.

How do I upload an image or picture for my Profile?

In the Trophy Room, on the upper left of the page, you will see the Profile module. Simply click the “Upload Image” link, and then select an image file (.jpg, .gif, .bmp) under 3Mb.  We will trim your image to fit inside a 200 x 172 pixel box, so to maintain higher quality, you may want to resize the image yourself before submitting.

How do I use the CrowdPicks Badge?

The CrowdPicks Badge is located in your Profile module (lower left in Trophy Room) and allows our members to show-off their sports cred across the web. You can insert (copy/paste) the Image code, Forum code, or Recruit code into any HTML-compatible text field such as message board, private messages (like the one on our site), email signature, or a web page. When you use the Recruit code we’ll be able to track if a member clicked on it and registered on our site and then give you credit for the recruit so you can bump up your Revenue Share for the month. In some cases you will find that only one of the codes will work so play around with it and spread the word via email and message boards! Simply click on the “Click here to Create Your CrowdPicks Badge” image link, select the sport you want to create a badge for, and then copy/paste the code into the application you want – it’s that easy!

How does the Bio feature work?

Members can display any information they want in the Bio section including links to your web site, blog, or just enter a text description of yourself. Simply select the "Edit" link and type in any information you want to display. If you want to display a link make sure to include the correct format of http://www.mylink.com. If you want the link to display as a label then precede the URL with the one word name of your label and a colon. For example, if you enter "Blog:http://www.mylink.com" then the word "Blog" will appear as a hyperlink to the www.mylink.com destination.

How does the Team Expert feature work?

When members make 5 or more picks on a team they become eligible for a Team Expert status which continues indefinitely across seasons without resetting. If your CrowdScore for picks on that team are in the top 5 for the entire community, you will be listed in the Team Experts list on the top left of the team page and also have the team logo appear in your Profile module “Stats” section in your Trophy Room. In the Profile module we display three team links randomly but you can view the entire list of teams and logos that you have expertise in by clicking the “View All” link which will expand the module and display all the team logos. Just click the “Collapse” link to minimize the module again. Obviously, if you make more picks, you will increase the number of teams you can become an expert for but you need to score well to make the Top 5.

How do I customize my Profile module in the Trophy Room?

The Profile module in the Trophy Room displays a lot of key information about the members of the CrowdPicks. Although we do want some consistency across everyone’s room, we also want to give you the flexibility to customize it a little bit. That’s why the top of each section of the Profile module contains small arrows which allow you to move that section up or down within the module. So if you want people to see your favorite teams at the top, simply click the up arrow until it’s at the top. Likewise, you can move sections down by clicking the down arrow. Play around with it and create something unique. You can also edit much of the information in these sections by simply selecting the “Edit” link on the top right of each section.

How do I use the Recruit feature?

This tool will make it easy for you to recruit all your friends to CrowdPicks. Simply click the “Recruit” button on the left navigation bar to take you to the page. Once there, you can either import all your contacts from your web mail accounts such as Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail or just manually enter the email address of one or more of your friends that you wish to invite. We provide substantial rewards in our Revenue Share program for those that recruit members and this can translate directly into cash for you at the end of the month. We will give you a one-time credit for recruiting a member and then 10% of all their monthly credits are given to you as well! Simply enter your email address and password and we’ll automatically retrieve all your contacts that don’t already have a registered account at CrowdPicks. If you want to manually add contacts to recruit just use the “Add Contacts Manually” button and then enter the email addresses in the text box provided. You can also include a personal message that we will add to the email text sent to your friend. We’ll check to make sure the people you recruit are real, someone other than you, and that they actually use the site. Keep in mind that if you recruit a friend that uses or has used the same IP as you have used in the past, you will not receive a recruiting credit and will not be eligible for a trophy! If all our recruiting criteria aren’t met we may take away any benefits you receive including trophies and any Revenue Share unique views. Unfortunately these steps are required to ensure a level playing field for the community.

How do I use the My Crowd feature in the Trophy Room?

My Crowd allows you to monitor content submitted by other members who you want to track you. You build a list of friends and the My Crowd module will allow you to conveniently view their avatar with recent content posted and quickly jump to their Trophy Room. More importantly, it will allow your friends to see your content and thus improve your participation stats and earn you more money in the Revenue Share program. Once you recruit a member to be a friend, a request is sent out, and once accepted, their avatar is added to your list. Clicking the “X” to the right of any avatar will remove them permanently from your list. The order of the friends that appears is ordered from top down by most recent content posted and then a random shuffle on the others to keep things fresh. If you wish to add members to your my Crowd module, simply go to their Trophy Room and click the “Add as friend” button on the top of their My Crowd module. You can recruit non-members by using the Recruit feature with the button on the left navigation menu. You can earn trophies and cash for recruiting friends that are non-members. The headlines that appear next to each friend will be the latest content submitted by that member. We’ll always order the friends in My Crowd so that those with new content are always on top. For the others that don’t have new content, we just randomly order them to keep things fresh.

 What is "Revenue Tracking"?

Our Revenue Sharing program will financially reward the top site contributors - since the CrowdPicks members are the ones building the community, then the members should benefit in the rewards. The Revenue Tracking module will allow you to monitor your credits and earnings. We will track the credits associated with Top 10 Leaderboard appearances, Featured Content, Picks used for “IntelliPicks”, and Recruits – all the components that make up your Revenue Share payout 

Throughout the day we rank all members based on traffic and assign a percentage to each. At the end of the month we will then take a portion of our revenue and distribute it based on the percentages. Note that due to rounding, some members with identical monthly Rev Share % displayed may receive a slightly different $ credit.

There will also be a minimum balance required before we will allow you to withdraw of $20, but this could change. You can use the “Pay Me” button to get the cash once the minimum amount has been met.

You must be 18 years of age or older to participate – no exceptions.

CrowdPicks staff will not participate in revenue share and their credits are not counted for payout.

This program requires you provide your full name and address so that we can mail you a check upon request. If you don not provide this information at the time you make the fund request, we will not be able to pay you. Your check will be mailed within 3 business days of your request. If your earnings reaches $600 during any calendar year we will be required to report the earnings to the IRS and therefore will need to collect and confirm your Name, Address, and Social Security number. We will provide a secure interface for collecting your SS# if your earnings exceed this amount. If you don’t provide this info upon request we will not be able to provide any more payouts to you. If your CrowdPicks account is inactive (no login) for 8 months and you have a Revenue Sharing credit, it will be forfeited and returned to CrowdPicks. Once again, your privacy is important to us and we’ll never share this info with anyone.

 Remember that CrowdPicks has the right to delete any content they feel is not appropriate and this may reduce your credits so posting bogus content won’t get you anywhere, except maybe banned from CrowdPicks. Our Terms of Use covers additional details about the program terms.

Right now you won't be able to make much.  We're going to put in a few hundred dollars per month and everyone will get a share of that.  In the future we would hope that by adding more members and making more revenue we will be able to share a much bigger amount. As of August of 2008 several members have collected almost $200 over several months – this may not seem like much to some people but this was earned simply by participating and having fun on the site.

Currently you cannot post an identical link to the same story as someone else, but there are usually similar stories out there, so there isn't a perfect way to prevent this.  With our "Featured Content" we favor blogs over news and video links so we hope that those that take the time to provide well thought out opinions rather than just a news link will get more credits and thus a better Revenue Share payout.

How does the Revenue Share Leaderboard work?

How Does CrowdPicks Make Money?

CrowdPicks generates revenue through several different sources including advertising, monthly and annual subscriptions, Store sales and ticket sales.

How do I use the Teams page?

For each sport we have provided a “splash” or entry page for accessing all the team pages for each sport. If you want to find information specific to a team then the best way to accomplish this is through the “Teams” link in the center of the secondary navigation menu. All the teams will display on the page and can be sorted and viewed in alphabetical order (“Alpha Sort”) or by “Division”. Once a letter is selected the teams will display in alphabetical order; by school name for NCAA teams and by mascot name for Pro teams. Also note that you can access any team page by simply clicking on a team logo anywhere on the site.

How do I post Notes on Team pages?

On the Team pages you will find a “Notes” module on the left side of the page. Simply select the “Add Message” link to post content.

What is the CrowdScore?

The CrowdScore is our rating system that reflects your sports cred or knowledge level.  We will track your results, calculate your CrowdScore and display an avatar that represents how good your predictions are for each sport that you make picks on.  This avatar is your sports status symbol or badge, and gives you the sports cred that you always knew that you deserved. Your Trophy Room is the primary location that we display all these avatars along with stats and other special trophies where you (and everyone else) can see them. You can also see your own avatar for the active sport selected on the upper right of the site while you are logged in, in content that you post, comments you write, and elsewhere throughout the site.

The CrowdScore, depending on the sport, may be composed of several categories including

a) The accuracy of your Win/Loss picks (W) - The ratio of correct Win picks to total picks displayed as a percentage

b) The accuracy of your Spread picks (ATS) - The ratio of correct Spread picks to total picks displayed as a percentage. In some cases, like NHL, MLB, and Soccer, we use a Moneyline to provide a bonus if you pick the underdog and they win.

c) The accuracy of your Over/Under picks (O/U) - The ratio of correct O/U picks to total picks displayed as a percentage

d) The accuracy of the score prediction - A measure of how close to the actual final score you are. If you pick the game score exactly as the result, you will obtain 100% for this category. NOTE: If you pick a score that is WAY OFF your CrowdScore will be penalized significantly!

f) How many picks you make - The more picks you make, the more credit you will obtain for this category. Generally, if you make about 50% of all the picks available you will obtain 100% credit for the category.

g) Bonuses you receive – we provide the opportunity to get a bonus that will boost your CrowdScore. As mentioned above, there is a Moneyline bonus for picking an underdog team that wins. We also offer a Rare Win bonus that can boost your score by 2% if you make a pick on an underdog that wins when 15% or less of our community picked that team to win. In NASCAR and PGA you can also earn a bonus for picking the right finishing spot for a 1^st, 2^nd, or 3^rd place finish. The bonus amount will be based on the odds for that driver or golfer to finish 1^st – the worst the odds of them winning, the higher the bonus we give for picking them to correctly finish in the top three.

Rare Wins – Each rare win will add a small bonus added to your game score of 2%

Moneyline - Since we don’t use spreads for MLB and NHL, we utilize the Moneyline values to create a CrowdScore bonus IF you pick the underdog to win, and they do. This bonus can give you a significant bump to your CrowdScore if the Moneyline gap between the two teams is large enough.

NASCAR & PGA Odds – We display the odds to win on the “My Picks” page and the lower the number, the higher probability, according to the Vegas bookmakers, that the driver or golfer will win. When you pick them to win you have the potential to get a big boost to your CrowdScore if they are a big-time underdog. In other words, if you pick driver #99 to win with odds of 6000, and he wins, you’ll likely get a nice bump to your weekly CrowdScore, as much as 20 CrowdScore points depending on how we have the bonus category weighted, which is then averaged in to get your Season CrowdScore.

Note that the majority of the CrowdScore hinges on the accuracy of the W/L, ATS, and O/U while the remaining categories make up less than 25% of the total score in any of our sports. For all sports with a spread available the ATS will be the most important category. NASCAR & PGA scoring is unique but also simple. We simply measure how close your pick place is to the actual result and this determines almost all of your CrowdScore (assuming you don’t get a bump from the odds bonus). Note that the NASCAR “Race Total” and PGA “Tournament Total” in your Stats & Game Picks module is NOT the final CrowdScore – factors including how early you pick and the odds bonus will affect your final CrowdScore.

The CrowdScore also utilizes upper and lower thresholds for each category. By setting these thresholds appropriately, we generate a CrowdScore that falls in the proper range – we want the top performer’s to be around 80-100. These also allow you to max out a score in one category without superhuman performance. For example, almost no one will ever pick a season of games with a 90% ATS – it’s simply too difficult when you pick many games. So we set an upper threshold like 70% for NFL and if you can achieve this level of performance for the ATS category you get 100% credit for that category. The lower thresholds we use because if you can’t perform at a minimum level 40% ATS then you don’t deserve any credit – flipping a coin or a monkey throwing darts can get you 50%. Finally, we also cap the performance in each category. So for example, if you get a 100% ATS on one or a few games with a 70% upper threshold, without a cap you would get a score of 100/70= 143. The main purpose is to ensure that someone making a few lucky picks doesn’t get a really high score. With a 110% cap and a 70% upper threshold, scoring more than a 77% in that category will no longer yield a higher category score. We know all this adds some complexity but it also ensures that all members can compete fairly even if they don’t all make the same number of picks.

We also require that a minimum number of picks are made for each sport throughout the season in order to appear on the Member list and Top Ten. The minimums will change throughout the season for each sport so monitor the messages on the My Picks page to determine what the minimum is for that sport. The more games per season a sport has the higher the minimums will be at each of the season trimesters we break it out into. There is also a separate weekly minimum for each sport that must be met before you can appear on the Top Ten list. Here is a breakdown of the minimum picks per sport through the season trimesters – THESE MAY CHANGE PERIODICALLY SO CHECK THE LEADERBOARD FOR THE MOST UPDATED VALUES:

Sport     min start     1/3 min.     2/3 min.

NFL            10             25             50

NCAAF        15             50             75

NBA            10             40             75

NCAAB        25             50            100

NASCAR       15             30             75

NHL            10             40             75

MLB            25             50            100

PGA             3             30             60

SOCCER      15             50           100

How do I track my CrowdScore?

The most obvious place to view your CrowdScore is right next to your user name and icon that follow you around the site on the top left of the pages.  The icon is associated with your CrowdScore and is used for easy identification to show everyone just how much you know your sports. You can view the best weekly performers on the home page Season Leaderboard or on the Leaderboard page and track your own season-long progress in your trophy room. Note that the “Last 7 Days” CrowdScore is based on a rolling 7 day time frame. During your first week of picks for the season this CrowdScore may change even without picks due to the way it is calculated. You can also check your progress in the Picks & Stats module in the Trophy Room where we display all your ranks for each category in each sport.

How do I improve my CrowdScore?

Since there are several components that make up the CrowdScore, make sure to pick as many games as you are confident in, pick the games early, don’t change any scores after you pick them (unless you absolutely must) and don’t be afraid to take some risks.  Taking some risks is the only way you will get a Rare Win bonus.

What is "ATS"?

“ATS” stands for “against the spread” and is referred to as “spread” or "point spread", or Vegas line, and it is the odds set by Las Vegas sports books that show which teams are favored to win, and by how many points.  The way the point spread is displayed is by either a negative number or a positive number next to a team name.  If a team has a negative number next to it, then that team is the favorite since you would be picking that team to win minus the points in the point spread.  If a team has a positive number next to it, then that team is the underdog since you would be picking that team to win plus the points in the point spread added in. On the Leaderboard page and on the Stats & Game Picks module, the ATS represents the performance or accuracy of picking one side of the spread. Keep in mind that if we can't get a line from our data sources then the game will not be made available for picks.

What is "O/U"?

The “O/U” or "over-under" is the odds set by Las Vegas sports books that show how many total points both teams are predicted to score in a game.  If you think the combined points scored by both teams will be higher than the over/under line, then you are on the "over" side.  If you think the combined points will be lower than the over/under line, then you are on the "under" side.  When the actual results come in from a final score, regardless of whether you picked over or under, you will either be on the correct side or incorrect side. Sometimes the final score is equal to the over/under line, and in those cases the result is a "push" displayed as a “P”. On the Leaderboard page and on the Stats & Game Picks module, the O/U represents the performance or accuracy of picking the Over or the Under. Keep in mind that if we can't get a line from our data sources then the game will not be made available for picks.

What is the "Moneyline" and how does it affect my CrowdScore?

The “Moneyline” is a metric set by Las Vegas sports books which measure the flow of dollars for incoming bets on a given game. On the “My Picks” page you will see one number associated with each team – usually one is negative and the other positive. The negative number is the favored (AKA “Fav”) team while the positive number represents the underdog (AKA “Dog”). The larger the gap between the absolute value of the two numbers, the larger the expected scoring gap in the game. In some cases no odds are set for games and the Moneyline is used instead. On our site, since we don’t use spreads for MLB, NHL, and Soccer, we utilize the Moneyline values to create a proprietary CrowdScore bonus IF you pick the underdog to win, and they do. This bonus can give you a fat bump to your CrowdScore if the Moneyline gap between the two teams is significant enough.

What is a "Rare Win" bonus?

What is the "Blind Spread" bonus?

We also want to reward those that take risk and try to estimate the spread and over/under without Vegas odds posted for the game, race or tournament. So if you want to take a chance and feel confident about your pick, you may get an extra bump in your score for making a pick early, before the Vegas odds are posted. However, it is not often that a game is available for picks w/o the Vegas odds.

This bonus is reserved for those that can make a perfect 1^st, 2^nd, or 3^rd place NASCAR or PGA pick – we don’t offer a bonus for picking other finishing places. If you correctly pick a top 3 finishing place for the NASCAR driver or PGA golfer, you will receive a CrowdScore bonus proportionate to the odds of that driver or golfer to win the event. For example, if you picked a long-shot to win with odds of 6000 then the bonus could be significant and will earn you as high as 20 points, depending on how we have the bonus category weighted. If they are favored to win the race with odds of 300-500 don’t expect to see more than a point or two added to your CrowdScore.

What is the Trophy Case and how does it work?

Every member has a trophy case inside their Trophy Room to display all their trophies and sports avatars. Members receive a blank avatar for each sport that a pick is made in. The higher your CrowdScore, the more stars will appear on your sports avatar. Once you attain a score of 95 or better you will completely fill the avatar with stars – something that will set you apart from the crowd.

Trophies are won by achieving specific accomplishments on CrowdPicks. These trophies vary in range from easy to extremely difficult to obtain. Trophies are separated into 3 categories – Progressive, Repeatable, and Unique (MVP). Clicking on a trophy in your case will show a detailed trophy pop-up; these pop-ups will allow you to see the trophy in better detail along with a full description of the trophy. In the trophy pop-up you’ll see arrows on both the left and right side which allow you to scroll through all the trophies available in your case. This is a convenient feature you can use to browse through either your own or other member’s trophies and see all the glorious detail we’ve created! Trophies are placed in your trophy case in order of rarity; trophies appearing in the top center of the case are the rarest on the site.

Progressive Trophies

• Easiest to win
• Five different versions based on higher contributions to each category.
• Track your Progressive levels in the trophy pop-up box when clicking on a trophy.

 Repeatable Trophies

• Somewhat difficult to win
• Each repeatable trophy can be won multiple times, track the number of times you have won a repeatable in the trophy pop-up details by clicking on a trophy.
• Weekly repeatable trophies can only be won every 7 days

Unique Trophies or “MVP”

• The most difficult trophies to win
• These are also the most unique and elaborate trophies to win on the site

NOTE: MVP Trophy Restrictions

For NASCAR & PGA

• You must meet all minimum picks requirements to qualify
• One of your drivers or golfers must have finished at least in 3rd place or better once during season to qualify

For all other sports

• Must meet all minimum picks requirements in each sport to qualify (see “What is the CrowdScore?” in FAQ)

Trophies available to win from CrowdPicks

Blogs Written

The Blogs Written trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for writing blogs. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

News Links Posted

The News Links Posted trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for posting news links. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Games Picked

The Game Picked trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for making picks on games. All games picked excluding NASCAR and PGA count towards this trophy. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Comments Posted

The Comments Posted trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for posting comments on blogs and other content. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Friends Recruited

The Friends Recruited trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for inviting friends to join CrowdPicks. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Trophy Room Views

The Trophy Room Views trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for getting other members to view your trophy room. A view will only be counted from a member that visits after 24 hours from their last visit. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Weekly Top 10

The Weekly Top 10 trophy is awarded for making the top 10 weekly ranking list in any sport. You can win this trophy as many times as you want, but after you win it, you must wait seven days to win it again.

Rare Win

The Rare Win trophy is awarded for picking the correct winner in a game that less than 15% of the CrowdPicks community has picked to win. You can win this trophy as many times as you like. NASCAR & PGA are not included in this trophy.

NFL Perfect Win Week

This trophy is awarded for picking a full week of NFL games correctly. You can win this trophy in 16 game weeks or when teams are off for BYE weeks. You cannot win this trophy during the playoffs. You can win trophy multiple times.

NFL Perfect ATS Week

This trophy is awarded for picking a full week of NFL games correctly against the spread. You can win this trophy in 16 game weeks or when teams are off for BYE weeks. You cannot win this trophy during the playoffs. You can win trophy multiple times.

Season MVP

This trophy is awarded at the end of every regular season and is given to the member that finishes at the top of the season leaderboard. To win the season MVP you must meet the minimum number of picks listed at the top of each sport’s leaderboard.

Season Team Expert

This trophy is awarded to the #1 team expert for a season. This trophy is awarded after the season has been completed. You can win this trophy multiple times and you can win it for any team, driver or golfer offered on the site.

10 Wins in a Row

This trophy is awarded for picking 10 consecutive game winners correctly in a single sport. You can win a separate trophy for each sport excluding NASCAR & PGA and you can win this trophy multiple times.

10 Wins in a row (ATS)

This trophy is awarded for picking 10 consecutive games correctly against the spread. You can win a separate trophy for each sport excluding NASCAR & PGA and you can win this trophy multiple times.

NASCAR Perfect Race

This trophy is awarded for picking the top 3 drivers correctly, in order, for a single race. You can win this trophy multiple times.

PGA Perfect Match

This trophy is awarded for picking the top 3 golfers correctly, in order, for a single tournament. You can win this trophy multiple times.

Videos Posted

The Videos Posted trophy is a progressive trophy awarded for posting videos. The trophy will increase in size for each level achieved.

Perfect Pick

The Perfect Pick trophy is awarded for making an exact score prediction on a game. Different sizes of trophies are awarded depending on the difficulty of picking that sport. You cannot win this trophy for NASCAR or PGA. You can win this trophy multiple times.

All CrowdScores – 60

This trophy is awarded for getting all your CrowdScores above 60. You cannot be benched in any sport and you must meet the sports minimums to be eligible.

All CrowdScores – 70

This trophy is awarded for getting all your CrowdScores above 70. You cannot be benched in any sport and you must meet the sports minimums to be eligible.

All CrowdScores – 80

This trophy is awarded for getting all your CrowdScores above 80. You cannot be benched in any sport and you must meet the sports minimums to be eligible.

All CrowdScores – 90

This trophy is awarded for getting all your CrowdScores above 90. You cannot be benched in any sport and you must meet the sports minimums to be eligible.

What do the different sports avatars represent?

Once you register for an account you will be the proud new owner of a blank sport avatar. Once you make your first pick, the associated sport avatar will activate and your CrowdScore will appear shortly after your first game picked ends. We provide the following avatars:

·         NFL – blue helmet

·         NCAAFB - orange helmet

·         NBA – gray backboard and hoop

·         NCAABB - white backboard and hoop

·         NASCAR – black wheel and tire

·         NHL – green mask

·         MLB – red batting helmet

·         PGA – orange golf club head

These avatars will follow you around the site on the top right of all pages, but also display in Top 10 lists, on the Leaderboard, My Crowd, in content posted, and of course in your trophy case. You can view the details in a pop-up window by simply clicking in any sport avatar in a trophy case – both yours and other members’.  

If you do not continue to make picks after 14 days in any sport you will be benched and your avatar will appear faded with a red “Benched” label. You will receive an email notice one day prior to being benched and simply making one pick in that sport will prevent you from getting benched. If you do happen to become benched you only need to make one pick to get off the bench.

When a season ends we will continue to display your avatar until the start of the next season (or pre-season) at which point we reset and start all over.

How do I get "Benched"?

In order to get benched, a sport must be in season and you must go 14 days without making a pick for that sport. Once you are one day from being benched an email will be sent to warn you. If by the next day a pick is not made you will be benched and another email goes out to rub it in. The good news is that it’s easy to get un-benched. To remove the benched status just make a pick on that sport and the status is lifted immediately including returning you back to the Leaderboards. Keep in mind that if you end the season with a benched status you will not show up in the Top 10 if you qualify and you will not show up in the Leaderboard. However, your Trophy Room avatar will return to normal without the “Benched” stamped on it when the season ends. Despite being benched your picks will continue to be used for the CrowdFilter results. These restrictions will ensure that members competing for the Leaderboard continue to remain active and don’t sit on a few lucky picks.