sponsored reviews Archive

The big news last week was the partnership that Yahoo and Microsoft entered into. Paul McDougall noted, “Microsoft’s search tools will appear on Yahoo’s sites while Yahoo takes on sales role.”

Sometime last month the default “server not found” page that my ISP provides seemed to change again. The page says it’s powered by Yahoo Search. But after a handful of tests over the weekend, it seems like it’s more a page of ads than anything else. I showed the page to a couple of “regular” Internet users and both were confused as to the provided results. Most people today know that ads on search are separated from the organic results.

What I was provided with by my ISP is some sort of combined ads and organic search results into one result set. In fact on some searches, organic results were nowhere to be found on the first page. What makes this even more odd is that the numbering for the results continues from the paid “sponsored” ads to the organic results.  

Here are a few examples (click to view larger images):
Continue reading “Hey Yahoo – Is This The New Sponsored Ad?” »

Guhmshoo with yet another great comic showing how bloggers are like Nascar racers by putting ads and sponsorships all over their websites.

PayPerPost has launched a new option named "Direct" which allows bloggers to sell reviews directly using the PPP processing system. ReviewMe has a similar option. Andy Beard has a very lengthy review of the new PayPerPost Direct service which he says he did not receive any monetary compensation for. Jim Kukral also reviews the service.

First, I don't understand why anyone would want to use this new system and give up 10% when they could easily sell the same service directly on their own. I guess there is a benefit to using the PayPerPost processing system but it just does not seem worth it to me unless you were running 20-30 paid reviews a week. Create your own graphic, sell the review yourself.

Second, for the majority of paid bloggers, this won't work. Why? It has nothing to do with PPP, ReviewMe or any of the other services. It has everything to do with traffic. I believe that most of the paid reviewers have very little (to medium) traffic. To make this work effectively, you need boat loads of traffic. And even more importantly, it has to be "advertiser traffic". Most of these paid blogs just don't have it. And even those that do, don't have the right type of traffic.

Mike, says that this is "selling your soul." I disagree. As I have said previously, there is nothing wrong with running an advertorial. Newspapers do it everyday and it looks just like regular news except for a tiny advertising line at the top of the page. Radio stations do it more than ever today. And they have no disclaimer when they say things like, "I am Big Papa DJ and I use Dr. Moulton's acne removal system. It removed my pimples in 2 weeks and I love it." Never a disclaimer. And the biggest radio personalities do it.

While I sometimes struggle with whether to add this type of "review" on CenterNetworks (we have not as of today), I don't think there is anything wrong with it overall. That is as long as you clearly state that this is a paid review. Is it the "review" aspect that we struggle with? I would love to see a paid Advertorial company start. No reviews. Just posting a paid advertisement as a post. Something that can easily be noted as paid and dealt with accordingly with the search engines. We all do it already. I do it. TechCrunch does it. Paid Content does it.

I do believe that PPP requiring positive reviews is not a good thing. And all of the paid review services can tell me until they are blue in the face that they don't require them. Bullhogwash. When you are receiving money for something, you tend to err on the side of the positive. Think about it like this. If you complete 10 paid reviews and bash every one of them, why would advertiser #11 want to risk it? I think the most important thing is to be "fair and balanced" in the review.

As bloggers, journalists and bloggers continue to struggle to generate revenue from their offerings, I am sure this "paid content" discussion will continue. I look forward to continuing the discussion and watching how things evolve.