The Business of Blogging
Blogging can be a tricky business, sometimes. We've been following the industry that has developed to support web logs (as they were originally called) for more than five years and in that time, the changes have been tremendous. One thing that has remained relatively constant within that time, though, is the difficulty of getting paid to blog. The very thing that makes blogs so fascinating to readers -- the opinionated voice, the occasionally unpredictable topics, the often personal details, and the interactive element -- tend to make big-time advertisers shy away. And for good reason -- plenty of advertisers were burned early on in the dotcom era when they (or worse, the media) discovered that their ads were accompanying, well, let's call it "inappropriate" user-generated content on sites like Theglobe.com.
But like the personal web pages of the 1990s, blogs are now being generated in large numbers. Whenever there is a crowd, there will be money-makers trying to profit from it, so it is hardly surprising that there are networks trying once again to aggregate eyeballs and sell them to advertisers. The latest entry in this field is ReviewMe.com. Will they make a go of it? At this early stage, it is hard to say. Their business model involves matching advertisers with bloggers who have signed up to participate. The advertisers can read the profiles of each blogger and invite only the ones that interest them to write a column featuring the advertiser's product or service. ReviewMe.com's guidelines stipulate that bloggers can write whatever they want (advertisers can't refuse to pay for negative reviews, for example) as long as it is at least 200 words and clearly discloses that the post is a sponsored piece. Important disclosure: with this piece we are testing ReviewMe.com's service.
As a small, advertiser-supporter site, we are always looking for new ways to generate income. So, as a reader, would you mind if we occasionally posted content that contained an ad? We would chose to review only products and services that we believe would be of interest to our travel-conscious audience, and as required by ReviewMe.com (and by our own conscience), we would make it clear when we were being paid to discuss a specific topic. Let us know what you think by sending us an email or posting your comments below.
But like the personal web pages of the 1990s, blogs are now being generated in large numbers. Whenever there is a crowd, there will be money-makers trying to profit from it, so it is hardly surprising that there are networks trying once again to aggregate eyeballs and sell them to advertisers. The latest entry in this field is ReviewMe.com. Will they make a go of it? At this early stage, it is hard to say. Their business model involves matching advertisers with bloggers who have signed up to participate. The advertisers can read the profiles of each blogger and invite only the ones that interest them to write a column featuring the advertiser's product or service. ReviewMe.com's guidelines stipulate that bloggers can write whatever they want (advertisers can't refuse to pay for negative reviews, for example) as long as it is at least 200 words and clearly discloses that the post is a sponsored piece. Important disclosure: with this piece we are testing ReviewMe.com's service.
As a small, advertiser-supporter site, we are always looking for new ways to generate income. So, as a reader, would you mind if we occasionally posted content that contained an ad? We would chose to review only products and services that we believe would be of interest to our travel-conscious audience, and as required by ReviewMe.com (and by our own conscience), we would make it clear when we were being paid to discuss a specific topic. Let us know what you think by sending us an email or posting your comments below.
posted by Insider Travel Guides at 8:46 AM
1 Comments:
We've been having this conversation over at my site and I think the key things you need to remember is as long as it is relevant and you're upfront about the intent of the post then most regular readers will be happy to take a look at the post.
The other thing is to also make sure that the post is in the general feel and rhythm of your blog so the post doesn't stand out like a sore thumb!
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