Dilemma of Paid Reviews!
Darren’s article asking people if they have written paid reviews on their blog came at an interesting time since I just got notified by pay per post rejecting the review posts I wrote sometime back!
Looking at the survey question responses on problogger, its clear that the blogging community is heavily divided on this issue and emotions run pretty high on both sides!
I wrote 2 (supposedly) paid review posts and both were a negative experiences for me. First one was on the car garage guy which got rejected because I included a video in the post! Well, I thought Tim Allen’s video would make an otherwise boring review post interesting but obviously the advertisers didn’t think so!
Second post was on pay day loans, a concept that I had never heard about, before reading on their site, and was titled Strapped for cash. This post also got rejected because pay per post guys cannot find a record of me first ‘reserving’ the ‘opportunity’ before writing about it! Even if they had found the record that I did everything I was supposed to do, they would have declined to pay because there is a link to another site in the post, my bad. Sometimes including interesting links only makes these otherwise bland posts a bit better, I thought - well, so much for what I think, they refused to pay!
I also thought the post headline was pretty good, if not better than a lot of the headlines Lyndon thought up if he were to write the same article!
Although I was pretty hesitant to write these kinds of posts to begin with, I confess I got tempted to earn $7 for some 50 to 100 word post! Now that this blog got page ranked 4, I see some ‘opportunities’ for as much a $20 per post, which can add up to a nice pocket money at the end of the month.
But as soon as I wrote the posts, I received a few emails from my readers suggesting I shouldn’t take sponsored posts! I haven’t tried Simonne’s guide for excluding the sponsored posts category from RSS feeds yet , which I think is a brilliant idea, but I am wondering if this would really work with people!?! Hiding these posts from the feeds doesn’t mean people wouldn’t be upset if they decided to come to the blog to read the articles and we do want to encourage them to comment and participate in the discussions, don’t we?
So, there, as much as I would like to write some sponsored posts, I’m afraid of driving readers away from here. I am thinking of building another blog (without fresh perspectives of course), but building content to get it approved would require time!
What about you? Are you writing paid reviews on your blog?
I used to write sponsored reviews on my blog, but I realized that my readers did not respond well to them — meaning, they did not leave comments despite the fact that those posts were written from a personal point of view (not from a marketing point of view).
That, and the fact that I was paid about USD25 for each review, which I have been told was low because I write good English, and my PR and Alexa and other “jazzy” stats are impressive, and that I actually deserved more..
Ouh well..
I haven’t had anyone tell me I should charge more ‘coz those are the only reviews I did
(one for $5 and the other for $7) but I did get quite a few emails asking me to keep this blog free from ‘paid’ reviews….. which I respect and as a matter of fact, activated two domains last night which I’ll be building slowly….
I noticed on problogger that Darren had to clarify that his reviews are never paid, ‘coz readers make a decision right off the bat otherwise… and if their reaction is so strong on a popular blog, I don’t think I want to take chances here
There has got to be a way to do paid reviews and not alienate readers so that you can make some money with your blog. It’s not an issue for me since my blog is a free one but I’d like to earn some money with it sometime in the near future.
Hi Pearl,
Like Teeni, both my blogs are free and therefore have no paid reviews and I don’t carry any text ads either.
It’s a contentious issue as some believe that paid reviews work and there are those for whom they don’t. I’m happy just to blog without the constraints of exterior forces.
Again, it all comes down to content and readers do return, comment and actively participate in discussions.
Have a great weekend
Take care
Colin
Hi Pearl,
I have looked at the issue of writing paid reviews on my blog. However I am not familiar enough with the process as yet. I would write paid reviews if I could find subjects that fit my Niche. I admit that earning some money here and there to help support my blogging habit would be a good thing.
I think maybe a sort of “intro” to a paid review would at least warn your readers who might me offended. And I would hope readers would understand your (my) need to earn a little extra cash here and there.
Nick
I have just started to write paid posts on my site in October. None of my readers complained yet. What I do: I exclude them from the feed, plus I choose only those things I would write about even if they weren’t paid. I’ll give you an example of sponsored post which I enjoyed writing and I think amused my readers: http://www.alltipsandtricks.com/blog/2007/10/22/bored-with-your-face-get-yourself-a-new-one-with-makeover-solutions/
However, I can understand your concerns: you have a lot of comments on your posts, you have focused blogs, while mine is full of articles taken from article databases (not anymore, but I did that last year on a quite large scale). I barely get any comments anyway, so I can’t say I miss them more on paid posts.
@teeni - the only way I know is to keep this blog free of the paid reviews but start another one for making real money
and then Ill also take off most of the adsense from here too!
hey Colin… you don’t do paid reviews on any of your blogs? Some of your niche blogs could easily fit those in though… like pc security?
Thats one of the major issues Nick, finding something that can easily fit in with the content of the blog and I can see why anyone would be upset, the reviews are either of the products or tools or services that have nothing to do with my goals on this blog… and more and more I think about it, Im convinced that it was a bad idea to begin with!
but of course, I am never against making money off of blogs, reviews wont somehow fit in here, as i see it! the thing is, i think readers don’t have to say they are upset, they’ll just go somewhere else…. 99% of the time I’d do the same… I was lucky some of them sort of alerted me before simply moving on!
In each of the posts, I did make it very clear that they were sponsored posts
thanks for commenting Nick…. hope to see you around here more often
I have no problems with paid posts although I haven’t written any on this blog I did post a few on some older blogs I used to run.
Some people seem to get it far more right than others. RT over at Untwisted Vortex does a good job and many could learn by his example. I often see reviews that people have written that are so lame and strained it does turn me off as a reader. One springs to mind where a lady was trying to say that she had finally narrowed down her vacation choice to some exclusive five star resort, on a blog where she constantly whined about her financial woes, her out of control debt, her unemployed spouse……it was so obviously untrue, well, you get my drift. That kind of thing is what turns people off and gives the critics and blog snobs all the ammunition they need to bash PPP and all the others.
I see nothing wrong in writing sponsored posts, but writing awful sponsored posts will probably bring you your just rewards. If I can find relevant subject matter and an advertiser who accepts a warts an’ all opinion on a product/service that I can write an informative post on, then I’d go right ahead. (Unless you are well established the reward is often hardly worth it though).
[...] Dilemma of Paid Reviews from Interesting Observations. [...]
I do plan to write them on OpTempo once it gets old enough to do it. I don’t plan to write them on my software development blog that is old enough and is PR4. It’s just a matter of it being an appropriate fit for one and not for the other.
On OpTempo I already do free reviews so the transition to paid would be easy.
Hi Pearl,
I’m sorry to admit I’m not as much of a regular reader of yours as I should be. I don’t know why. I enjoy your writing.
This post has special significance to me because I’m dealing with the same decisions you are about monetizing my blog.
I see you have a fair number of ads in your sidebar and a few in your main column but I would bet they don’t produce much, probably not much more than one paid post. I know mine didn’t. In fact I had one conversion on a Google referral that paid more than my entire AdSense total to that point. It paid $8. That’s when I decided to dump the ads.
With my new PR4 I decided to start monetizing again through a few paid posts and informed my readers of my decision. I haven’t received a single complaint.
It bothers me that some of your readers feel it’s OK to demand that you not be compensated for your time. It requires absolutely no effort at all to NOT read a post. If you see it is a paid post, simply skip it.
Click, scroll, Ta Da!
Paid Post Gone!
What’s the problem?
One thing I do is not let the paid posts enterupt my regular posting. In fact, I make a point to post a regular post imediately behind a paid post so the paid post doesn’t spend any time at the top and the readers have something to read.
I don’t expect my readers to read my paid reviews. Those advertisers are buying my PR4 links not the views.
This is your blog, Pearl and I would never tell you how to run it. Period.
I just wanted to put in my 2 cents and offer my support.
hey Simonne… that is a real fun post (just commented there) … it was only recently I started looking into these and you are right, one has to be very careful of selecting only appropriate reviews; but you saw the ones I did, (links are in this post), okay they were a little off topic, but I tried to make them interesting …. these darn ad agencies have too many stupid rules
Oh about comments, I live to see them … I love each and every comment on the blog, honestly! Oh you are being modest now, you do get them and get a lot too….. i still remember your top 5 project about fingers
Hey Maurice: RT is definitely a PRO at writing reviews, without a doubt! I agree with you a 100% that it has to be interesting and engage the readers, and if I decide to write reviews on a regular basis, either here or on another blog, I’d definitely have to learn the art. If you take a look at my first review post on car garage guys, I thought it was funny to keep readers on the post engaged for a while and let them click at the advertiser’s link but they rejected the post and thats beyond my comprehension!
thanks for commenting Maurice… tc and kit
PS: ‘they’ meaning the advertisers rejected the post and when some readers showed concern, I had second thoughts!
thats a good way to make the transition Frank C… people are already used to your free reviews so they probably won’t mind if you get paid for them also…..
thanks for stopping by to comment….. tc and kit
Hi Ad Tracker: I’m glad you swung by and took the time to write here… I’d be delighted to have you share your ideas and opinions more often here …..
No one complained really, the emails were more like friendly advice and I was glad they were vocal enough to alert me, ‘coz I’d have hated to lose any of my subscribers…
you are absolutely right, adsense or any of these other ads are mere distractors and haven’t made me any money so far… signing bonuses for some affiliates is better than what I have made with these! So, yes, they will all be gone as soon as I change themes…
thats a great point to not let the reviews sit there by themselves and have a rather good post immediately above it… I’d definitely make that a must if I continue with them…
hey, like I said, thank you so much for the support and sharing your views… take care and stay in touch…
how are you? am back home now
I agree with you Pearl, I thought your review about that garage organizers was good, they should have appreciated your creativity. Unfortunately, regarding the loan stuff, everybody is probably so sick of loans and mortgages advertising, that even well-written articles look a bit cheesy.
For writing about such things, I set up a special blog about personal finance issues (not yet accepted by PPP, but I’ve got some assignments from SponsoredReviews.com).
I’m also having the same problem. Some reader complaining about it but I have some that like the post, especially the one that pretty useful for them/ related to the blog subject.
Simonne: pay day loans was a bad choice I agree… just googled it in blog search, my God, there are million of them reviews already, no wonder people get sick of looking at them… and I agree, theres only so many creative ways to write about it… I’ve already set up a couple of blogs for something like this and we’ll see how that goes… thanks Simonne for the moral support though
Ken: having a separate blog is a smart idea. This has been a learning experience though
My blog is consumer oriented (reviews of goods and services), so it’s hard for me to NOT find opps that fit. My traffic increased when I started writing them, and I’ve never received a complaint.
I write reviews, etc. It’s my blog, I can do what I want!
The photos on my blog are created with a camera, which costs money, not clicks. The same for lenses, memory cards, flash units and assorted accessories. The blog itself is on a server, that costs money.
It’s all the way you write the reviews. RT is a master. I’ve had no complaints from my readers, and some of the “sponsored” posts receive more comments than other articles.
While you may have a PR 4, Google will quickly smack you down for selling links. My Alexa and Technorati rating were the highest of my circle of blog friends. When the new rankings were released last week they were “granted” a 4 or 5, I was given a 2.
In my case, it is the only source of income for the blog. And as I have a low PR, almost nothing is available for me. Also, I see a lot of sites that adhere to the review.me concept. But I guess you need traffic for that too.
Hey Pearl, it seems we think pretty much alike: I’m waiting to get 10 reviews approved with PPP, so I can submit them some other blogs, where I can write about everything
I wrote 11 reviews last month and I got only two approved so far. I’m curious if I’m going to get paid for all of them. I’ll keep you posted.
@Maurice: I wouldn’t consider myself a pro. I consider myself lucky to find PPP opportunities that I have experience with. I’ll be 47 this month. I have a lot of experience.
@Pearl: The “art” of sponsored posts is simply doing exactly what they ask for and nothing more. You can make the posts longer but not shorter, but the added text has to be relevant in some way. No extra video, links or anything like that unless they point to the sponsors site.
I wouldn’t worry too much about specific readers who are turned off by sponsored posts/paid reviews. For every ONE of them there are at least TWO who aren’t bothered by them in the least.
Hi Jeremy - I liked your blog on consumer goods and subscribed to it… and I didnt know about bloglightening either… Consumer’s Corner blog name doesn’t leave any room for complaints
thanks for stopping by…
hey Stevo… love the pictures on your blog btw… sorry you got PR2, I don’t think anyone quite understands it yet how google rates blogs… but Im sure with time you can improve it… I understand your sentiment about all of the expenses involved and if no one has a problem and if it is working why not…… my bests to you..
Olivier: I think if you keep posting regularly and actively participate in the social networking sites, be helpful and supportive to others in whichever way you can, your traffic will increase… I couldn’t open your blog site for some reason! reviewme is starting to show me some ‘campaigns’ that I qualify for, after all these months!
hey Simonne - lol, I think we do
wait, don’t you have to wait for the approval before writing the reviews though? oh yeah, I should be able to write reviews of just about everything on the other blog (your ‘everything’ has a devilish sound to it :D) - would you be kind enough to mail me the urls pls?
I hope you get paid for all too… yep, pls keep us posted….
Hey RT….. thanks for good advice, always……
Theres no substitute for experience….
hope you have a great birthday 
you’ve got to tell us the date then…..
Hey RT,
Pearl referred to you as a PRO, not me
In terms of years I’m close on behind ya - yes sir, no spring chicken any longer …….but from one ole fella to another, I do think you integrate your sponsored stuff really well, so here’s wishing you many, many more years of experience!
No Secret. November 28, 1960. Every so many years, Thanksgiving Day falls on my birthday and I get to celebrate with a turkey. A turkey for a turkey.
Hi Pearl, I’ve just started writing Sponsored Posts for PPP myself. I’ve done two, one approved and another waiting for approval.
I almost fell into the same trap you did - in my draft for the “I signed up for ppp” post, I linked to a couple of RT’s sponsored posts to show just how good sponsored posts can be. I figured that it would add value to the post for the advertiser (PPP). But the opportunity was fully reserved for a week and when it came up again, I had second thoughts and removed all links except for the one they asked for. I guess that’s safer.
Anyway, I think you should continue with sponsored posts. Some people will be worried by it, but then some will be worried by any sort of ads! If your normal content’s good enough, people will keep coming back even if there are some sponsored posts.
I plan to follow a similar set of guidelines to RT’s, making sure there are at least 4 non-sponsored posts between sponsored posts, only writing about topics that I feel comfortable writing about, only doing them if I’m allowed to disclose they are sponsored, etc. I think this will work well.
RT, I’m 9 years, 357 days younger than you (leaving leap years out of it)!
Nov. 28th? that’ll be easy to remember, ‘coz mine was Oct 28th…
Hi Steven: follow RT is the mantra regarding ppp
I still think the ad posts could be so much more fun to write and read with every one coming up with more creative material…
thanks for stopping by and voicing your opinion Steven, hope to see you around here more often… tc and kit
Hi Pearl,
thanks for trying to visit my blog. Unfortunately, I was just moving from blogger to a self hosted WP install. The site is up again, but I need to tweak it a bit, as I am not used to WP at all. One thing I want to do it to have the nofollow tag removed, as on your site.
On the traffic issue: yes, I know, I am working on it and I am starting to see some goos results. I have an average of 2 visitors per day, which I think is not too bad at all. I have a few strategies planned to improve that (like commenting on nice and interesting blogs like yours). I hope to double my score in 2 month from now!
Its best to put our readers first. Sponsored reviews are basically biased since the sponsor wouldn’t want you to say negative things about their company. The first time I found out about sponsored reviews is from John Chow. He makes quite alot from it. However, a idea is to have sponsored reviews on your blog, and like you said, leave it out from the RSS, yet do not delay your other posts because of the sponsored ones. i.e. sponsored posts should be considered as an extra rather than a substitute to posts.
I would stay far away from Paid Reviews. Many have been penalized by Google for doing paid reviews (as we all know the concept behind them is to get links). Do it at your own risk, but don’t say you weren’t warned.
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