Robert Cefail on Blogging for profit

Like almost any other form of online marketing, blogging has been getting a really tarnished reputation for people using their blogs to try to make some profit.

Check out what this slashdot comment says about Microsoft trying to use bloggers for marketing purposes:

Stony Stevenson writes "In an effort to inject Microsoft's latest slogan, 'People-ready business', into popular usage (and no doubt raise its Google page rank), Microsoft asked a passel of A List Bloggers to write blurbs on what this meaningless phrase means to them. Michael Arrington, Om Malik, Fred Wilson, Richard MacManus and a handful of others happily agreed to churn out some mush for Microsoft, which it later used in banner ads. What it really meant to these guys was income. Redmond paid the bloggers for every user who clicked through to the PRB microsite. That caused other bloggers, lead by Gawker chief Nick Denton, to rightfully question their ethics. A spitball war has been raging ever since."

Robert Cefail says:

Big companies trying to influence bloggers to help them market all their products all the time, but influencing search engine results is also part and parcel of what a lot of bloggers are trying to do, whether they admit it or not.

I don't know why people are so upset about this, when adsense ads and even more different types of advertising based on links are all over the place on blogs.

Blogs are a great tool for marketing, and communicating your viewpoint to others, but this shows that you should think twice before you make your advertising hidden, as opposed to just honest ads and shameless plugs. Hey speaking about a shameless plug, check out http://robertcefail.org
for all the latest info about making money on the internet!!!

Does that upset you? Probably it wouldn't. Its hidden advertising that has people so up in arms. Until next time,


Robert Cefail