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Why Should Blogs Be Different?
By Matt Keough | August 30, 2007
A recent study from Marketing Daily finds that eight out of ten Americans know what “blog” means. Search engine marketing and online PR people might not find this surprising. It seems that everybody wants a blog these days. It also seems that some people who own or write for blogs are a little surprised that they are approached by representatives of corporations, in order to request coverage of their products. The article linked above includes this:
Some advertisers are trying to slip brand names in through the blogosphere’s back door by recruiting bloggers to write favorably about their brands.
Are we supposed to infer advertisers are doing something unseemly? I’m shocked, shocked I tell you! Why would anyone think that promoters of brand names would not want to seek favorable coverage?
If you are publishing your thoughts, you are to one degree or another hoping those thoughts will influence others. It stands to reason that you would then attract the attention of marketers, who by the way, are also in the influencing business.
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August 31st, 2007 at 9:54 am
I find this trend highly disturbing. I firmly believe it happens, but I think of it much like when you pick up a magazine, and see something that looks and smells like an article, but is an advertisement that is only denoted by tiny text somewhere on the page that says “advertising content” or something similar.
August 31st, 2007 at 7:08 pm
It’s inevitable that advertisers take advantage of this medium. They will do anything to gain exposure for their products. It’s a bit unseemly maybe, but not surprising.
September 2nd, 2007 at 7:31 am
I do a lot of SEO / online PR work for a large company in the UK and were always looking for ways to get more links (since its the most important SEO currency there is & buzz.
I have used reviewme and payperpost, (which as your readers will know are companies acting as marketplaces between bloggers and corporates interested in product / link placement on blogs.
My experience is largely negative. The bloggers who have credability, charge a fortune and insist on ‘a sponsored post’ tag. And from a linking point of view, the links get buried very quickly as the content churns.
Essentially I have found if the product or service has no merit - you can’t really get the blogosphere to ‘big it up’
So we decided to recuit several known bloggers (in our marketplace) and build our own news site and build reputation the way it should be built - through great writing and insight.
September 7th, 2007 at 3:54 pm
This “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” approach espoused by Nick Garner in the previous comment seems like a sensible way to get the best buzz from blogs. After all, no one is really going to be served by a stealth paid positive review except for the one who paid, and this concept strikes me as unethical. At least when you recruit bloggers to work for you and build your reputation on its own merits then you have legs to stand on–and honest legs. This saves everyone–bloggers and promoters alike–some face and makes the internet as a whole less seedy.