Despite feeling like a complete shill when I do post a ReviewMe entry, I at least try and make it fit my blog topic and it’s written by my own fair hand.

I simply do not like the idea of someone else writing my blog for me…

Even being marked as “Sponsor Post” doesn’t necessarily make it clear that it was written by the sponsor, rather than simply paid for by them (but written by the regular author, as with “traditional” paid review posts).

I suppose, as long as it is made very clear that the regular blog author did not write this, it might be a viable business model for some blogs. Personally, though, I don’t think I’d ever run advertorials on any of my blogs.

I haven’t done paid reviews because I feel they are more disingenuous than advertorials. I feel that our readers would think that a paid review isn’t honest because we are getting paid for it, even if we mentioned some negative points. We do unpaid reviews and our readers really appreciate them because they are completely candid (though we don’t post reviews for products we don’t recommend).

Our readers do complain when we have too many advertorials, but in general, I think they do appreciate them because they learn about new products and services (especially because the companies that buy advertorials tend to be small and relatively unknown). And we only accept advertorials (and all ads, really) from companies we believe are relevant to our readers.

In the future, I may consider doing paid reviews of other gossip sites but I would really have to take it slow and rely on user feedback.

My other concern is what you’ve already mentioned the “disruption of style/voice.” What if I don’t like what was said within the review am I able to reject it? I’ve been searching for a guest blogger for a little while, and it’s taking time because I need to find the right fit for my blog it doesn’t seem like I would have control of that with this new feature. I imagine it will be a good fit for some blogs but I know it won’t work well with mine.

I occasionally write for paid for post companies when I see something I’m interested in for example, my last review was about Macintosh rentals and I leaped at it since I own a MacBook Pro and I I’ve wondered what I would do if something happened to mine. I’ve talked about my Mac a few times on my blog.

Occasionally I’ve written about things my readers are interested in, for example, I wrote a review about an online scrapbooking service (I picked up a lot about scrapbooking just by visiting their websites) and I actually became interested in scrapbooking by constantly visiting their websites. My posts are clearly marked “This is a sponsored post” right at the top. I had it at the bottom, but I quickly changed it since I didn’t want my readers to feel “tricked” into reading a paid review.

I’m trying to build a strong community, and I don’t want to go that route by posting lots of paid reviews about topics I could care less about. I’ve seen that happen on a few blogs lots of paid content but very little real posting going on. A few of my blog pals actually wondered why there regulars had stopped commenting? I was one of them that left. I didn’t want to, but it became annoying scrolling through the mind numbing number of posts they put out daily only to find that the majority was paid reviews. I think they crossed over the line, and it turned off their readers. I still communicate with them but its through email.

I know this service would not go over well with my readers so I won’t use it.

For Advertisers: You control the message. Enter up to 250 words including links back to your website and also an image of your choice.

For Publishers: Less work. Simply cut and paste our code into your blog.

Sounds like a lot of duplicate content to me!

However, I think this whole idea of the publisher writing the ad copy is just a bad idea. Some of them may offer half-decent content, but let´s face it, most readers dislike it when you post a sponsored review, most are not impressed with guest bloggers, imagine combining the two?

That’s not to say that this is not going to be a hugely successful idea. I don’t even like advertorial content in print so the change of medium is unlikely to change my mind about them. I think advertorials are generally painful to read and stilted in their “friendly” writing. Most of them sound like your socially-conscious long-lost relatives who are talking down to you and somehow trying to be over friendly in their attempts to make it seem like we’ve known each other a long time and are one big happy family. I’m sure everyone knows what I mean.

So in case it hasn’t come through, no, I’m not a huge fan of this idea. And I don’t think it will fit well into many blogs, except maybe a small minority of marketing laden blogs whose identity is seeped with the heavy marketing already.

But what do I know? I’m not making enough online moolah, and/or I’m not willing to fake enough figures to be a “internet marketing guru” and sell you all the secrets of the universe, after having to plough through a 30 page long landing page, for &399 only. Hurry and place your order now because the price doubles in 12 hours 52 minutes and 13 seconds. See you at the bank. :)

I can’t see me ever using the advertorial system, I don’t think it adds any benefit to my blog or the readers.

That said, the two specific problems you mention are, I think, extremely important. I don’t like the idea of having no control over the content of the article, and my blog would hardly be unique if the same piece appeared on many blogs.

Be well and enjoy the day.

Support Progressive Change

Several weeks ago I read (I wish I could remember where!) someone make the argument that they would prefer to see a pure advertorial than a review written by the blogger. Then, it is understood that the blogger has merely sold some real estate and the post is not indicative of the bloggers opinions. The argument boiled down to the reader giving the Advertorial the same weight as a banner ad.

I don’t think they’re insulting nor deceptive. Advertorials are used in every medium and only the most dense individuals have trouble recognizing them. If they’re clearly marked and presented as such, an argument can be made that they are PREFERABLE to a review written by the blogger.

Tim

If there is no SEO improvement, and the blogger isn’t allowed to have their own opinion, then what is the benefit?

With a normal ReviewMe blog post, the blogger still has some flexibility because they aren’t forced to write a positive review. So at the end of the day, that blogger is still saying this is a good product (if, they do in fact like your product).

With the advertorials, the blogger controls almost nothing. So the blog isn’t endorsing anything – it becomes less testimonial and more blatant ad copy. I think everyone will agree that testimonials are more useful than more sales copy.

Just my thoughts,

– Mason

It seems blogging is becoming more and more like commercial media which relies on advertisement for funding.

First of all, like you said, the ads could be written in a totally differant way than how your blog is written. That would create a clash of text – and clashes of any type are rarely good.

Secondly, if you placed advertorials on your site, you would have no controll of the text. You never do, but this format could create a problem. If an advertizer can change the text (and link?) at will, the advertizer could add inapropriate content, bash your blog, or any number of other similar mini-evils.

The best fix for those two problems would be to create an approval and/or contact service between the blogger and the advertizer. That way, the blogger could advize the advertizer on how to write the ads – thus allowing the two to communicate on how to best write the add – for the blogger and advertizer.
The approval service would allow the blogger to say no to anything explicit, bad, etc.

Again, like I said, it has great potential for creating web advertizing 2.0 – but needs some fine tuning.
Even so, it is probably a better option as opposed to AdSense or Text-Link-Ads.

But I’m no expert.

Consider print advertorials. Now pretend that they are listed in the table of contents of the magazine, or teased on the front page with newspapers. Now pretend that they say “By Authorname”, where “Authorname” is the same person who writes legitimate articles in the publication. Not pretend that they look exactly like regular articles. Not close — exactly the same. Now pretend that the publication sends out the advertorials over a news wire along with all its real stories.

Would you read such a publication? Would you value its content?