Linkworth enters Pay Per Post club
Text link advertising firm Linkworth has officially entered the Pay Per Post market.
First off, I like Linkworth. I’ve been a publisher for about two years now and they send a few hundred bucks my way every month. The links have always been on intrusive and I’ve had full control over who I accept as advertisers and who I reject. And most of my advertisers are happy because about 75% of them have been with more for more than a year.
But I would question this new move. Pay Per Post is a marketing scheme that allows advertisers to pay bloggers to write a post about their product or service. Back in 2006 I actually did a couple of these, making sure it was clear that the post was a PAID REVIEW. But since then I’ve been against the practice and will never do it again.
It’s not that I’m against the idea altogether, because if one is responsible about it, I believe it can be done without harming the blogosphere. The problem is… not everyone is responsible and it has started a whole new breed of spam blogs.
The controversy is not new. When PayPerPost.com hit the scene the blogosphere went wild. Many big timers came out against it and the debate grew into a very healthy level of dialog. It’s a debate that has yet to be resolved.
Business Week published a column titled “Polluting The Blogosphere” that you may want to read.
But moving on to Linkworth…
The following was just received via a Linkworth newsletter.
LinkPost – Paid Blog Reviews
The second product is called “LinkPost”. LinkPost allows partners to be paid for reviewing products and/or services from an advertiser. To qualify for this service, you must list your blog/site into our system. Once advertisers select your blog for a review, you can review their requirements and product to be written about. At that point, you can either select to write about it or decline the offer.
There is no mention of requiring a disclaimer. This means that any spam blog can pop up giving paid reviews which can artificially inflate the importance, quality, value, or relevance of a product or service.
It’s encouraging to know that Linkworth is looking to expand it’s product line, but I’m not so sure this is the right direction to move in.
Thoughts?
-Eric Odom
Matt Stoddart Says:
Eric, thanks for the feedback! Honestly, we’re really excited about LinkPost because it’s something we’ve been considering for a long time. Thanks for taking the time to give us your spin…I really appreciate that.
Now, while I completely understand the issue surrounding disclosure vs. non-disclosure, I think that the bloggers themselves are the ones to determine the best way to handle that. I mean, they know it’s a paid post, right? I think it’s pretty simple…a blogger can open a post with that disclosure if they choose to do so. If not, then they don’t….whatever. As long as the advertiser gets a review based on their requirements and the blogger accepts the task, who cares, you know?
We do include code with each LinkPost that will enable you to call an image that identifies a post as “paid” but publishers aren’t required to use it. What we don’t want to do is “mandate” certain things that really don’t matter. You’ve been with LinkWorth for a long time so you probably know that we tend to stay out of your way as long as our TOS are upheld. LinkWorth is just a community of publishers and advertisers that can do their business as they wish and we like it that way.
I know this is a gray-area and we certainly don’t claim to be anyone’s moral compass. We’re just building an advertising portal that suits the needs of our clients. And this service is in demand.
Thanks again, Eric!
Posted on April 16th, 2007 at 10:45 am